Genius Inventor, Not-So-Sharp Businessman
- Dennis L. Peterson
- 4 days ago
- 4 min read
Edison, Howe, Bell, Henry, Smith, and Wesson.
These are the names of men renowned for not only their numerous inventions but also the fortunes those inventions brought them. They were both great idea men and shrewd businessmen.
Like them, Walter Hunt was an accomplished inventor. He has been referred to as a "prolific inventor," a man with "a penchant for invention and innovation," and one who was "compulsively creative."
But he was also described as a "business dunce.... [H]is business acumen was lacking." Despite his numerous inventions, he was often in debt and sold most of his inventions, both those he had patented and those he hadn't bothered to patent, to pay off debts and make ends meet for his family.
For example, he once owed $15 to a draftsman whom he had hired to draw the designs for one of his patent applications. Pacing the floor of his workshop, trying to think how he would pay off that debt, he absentmindedly picked up a short length of wire and began nervously twisting it in his fingers.
Suddenly, as he looked at the wire in his hands, he had a "light bulb" moment. He set to work. To that simple wire he added a twist in the middle to create a spring. He sharpened one end of the wire to a point. To the other end he added a clasp that served as a protective case for the sharp end so users wouldn't pierce their fingers or other body parts.
In only three hours, he had invented what he called a "dress pin." Today we know it as the safety pin. He completed the paperwork for a patent and applied for it. He was awarded that patent, U.S. Patent No. 6,281, on this date in 1849.
Hunt then sold his rights to the safety pin idea to W. R. Grace & Co. for $400, and he paid off his debt and even had some left over. The Grace Co., however, went on to make millions from Hunt's invention.
So now you now "the rest of the story," as Paul Harvey famously said so often.
Or do you?
There's more to the story!
I said that Hunt was prolific. Among his other inventions were a fountain pen, a knife sharpener, a sewing machine, an alarm bell for streetcars, a rope-making machine, a coal-burning stove, a device for moving furniture more easily, a nail-making machine, boot hobnails, a tree saw, an ice-cutting machine for boats, a paper shirt collar, and even a rifle.
But, as I also said, Hunt had poor business skills. He quite often sold his inventions so he could solve immediate financial problems and obligations. He "enjoyed the process of creation over reward and riches."
For example, having failed to get a patent on his sewing machine, he was incensed when Elias Howe and Isaac Singer developed sewing machines of their own using his ideas and designs. He was embroiled in an intellectual property feud with the two men that lasted for more than a decade. Just to end the dispute and get on with his business, Singer agreed to pay Hunt for the design, but Hunt died before he could collect a penny of it.
In another example, Hunt developed a design for what he called his "volition repeater rifle." Characteristically, he sold his design to a businessman named George Armstrong, who hired the Robins and Lawrence Arms Company to manufacture it. Three men working for the company made improvements to the firing mechanism.
Maybe you've heard of those three men. Benjamin Tyler Henry later produced the most feared or most loved (depending on whether one was on the giving or the receiving end of it) rifle of the War Between the States, the Henry Repeating Rifle, the firearm that you could "load on Sunday and shoot all week."
The other two men were Horace Smith and Daniel Wesson. They would later form the world-renowned firearms partnership of Smith & Wesson. All three men made their fortunes, thanks in part to the work of Hunt, who never earned a penny of it.
Hunt died when he was 63 years old. Pneumonia. His obituary in the New York Tribune read, "For more than 40 years, he has been known as an experiment in the arts. Whether in mechanical movements, chemistry, electricity or metallic compositions, he was always at home, and, probably in all, he has tried more experiments than any other inventor."
But his lack of business skills prevented his capitalizing on his inventive genius. Some have it, others don't.
More about Hunt, his life, and his inventions can be heard on the Our American Stories radio program hosted by Lee Habib at the following web address:
You can also listen to some of my own stories that aired on Our American Stories at
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