LIGHT BULB
Invented: 1880
Inventor: Joseph Swan
Cheap and reliable electric lighting was a holy grail for 19^th-century inventors. But didn’t Thomas Edison get there first? No! He was beaten by to it by Britain’s very own Joseph Swan. Swan got his patent - and started manufacturing and selling his bulbs - in 1880. The first bulbs lasted little more than 12 hours but, unlike gas lamps, there was no flame or dirty smoke and they soon caught on


MODERN FIRE EXTINGUISHER
Invented: 1818
Inventor: George William Manby
The first modern extinguisher, the Extincteur, was invented after Manby saw firemen struggling to put out a blaze on the top floors of a house fire in Edinburgh. His solution was a portable copper cask containing three to four gallons of potassium carbonate, which dispersed by compressed air via a stopcock.