Lewis Carroll

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (January 27, 1832 – January 14, 1898), better known by the pen name Lewis Carroll, was a British author, mathematician, logician, Anglican clergyman and photographer.

Inventions

Lewis Carroll seems to have thought a lot about how to solve some common technical problems of the day. The fact that he was able to understand and use new technologies is amply demonstrated by his use of the camera, which was not as user-friendly as it is today.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

One such invention, as cited in his journal on September 24, 1891 and as published in, was a system of writing called Nyctography and a tool called the Nyctograph. He invented this because he would be unable to sleep at night and would want to write down his ideas to clear his head. But, wanting to go quickly back to bed, he did not want to go through all the mechanical steps involved in lighting a lamp. He designed a card with square holes in a regular grid. One would always make a dot in the upper-left corner and then make other dots and/or strokes. These symbols were designed to look somewhat like the letters or numbers they represented. This did not seem to be used for any longer writings, since no writings with these symbols survive. But it is probable that Lewis Carroll himself would use this to make short notes to jog his memory, and then he would probably write the idea out in his journal.

Related Topics:
September 24 - 1891 - Nyctography - Nyctograph

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

He also invented the pencil and paper game Word Ladder.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~