The increase in life expectancy during the 20th century is largely due to improvements in child survival; this increase is associated with reductions in infectious disease mortality, due largely to immunization.1 However, infectious diseases remain a major cause of illness, disability, and death.
The First Mowers. The lawn mower was invented in 1830 by Edwin Beard Budding, an engineer from Stroud, Gloucestershire, England. He obtained the idea after seeing a machine in a local cloth mill which used a cutting cylinder (or bladed reel) mounted on a bench to trim cloth to make a smooth finish after weaving.
The year 1893: The world's first hemstitch sewing machine. In 1893, Karl Friedrich Gegauf invents the hemstitch sewing machine. This machine can sew 100 stitches per minute. It was the world's first machine of this type, and also caused a major sensation abroad. The mechanical production of hemstitching was subsequently known simply as gegaufing.