automaton

Automatic Man source A walking automaton has been invented by Louis Philip Perew of Tonawanda, which eclipses, so far as known, any other similar invention ever made. Of heroic proportions this mechanical wonder is shaped in very way like a man. Not only can it walk but it's eyes roll, it's...

There had to be something in the water in the 18th century. A whole lot of people acquired some amazing skills out of, what seems, nowhere. Another one of these brilliant individuals was Pierre Jaquet-Droz. He was born on July 28, 1721, in La Chaux-de-Fonds, in Canton Neuchâtel, Switzerland. He...

In November of 1928, a truck pulled up to The Franklin Institute science museum in Philadelphia and unloaded the pieces of an interesting, complex, but totally ruined brass machine. Donated by the estate of John Penn Brock, a wealthy Philadelphian, the machine was studied and the museum began to...

The Peacock Clock is a large automaton featuring three life-sized mechanical birds. It was manufactured by the entrepreneur James Cox in the 2nd half of the 18th century and through the influence of Grigory Potemkin it was acquired by Catherine the Great in 1781. Today it is a prominent exhibit...