Microwave Ovens Were Born Of An Accident



Posted: Friday, February 05, 2010

by
Annie Deakin

Many people may not know it, but microwave ovens were born of an accident. In fact, the microwave oven is a great example of how one thing can be invented purely as a result of activities carried out to improve or invent another thing. As it pertains to these cooking units, the accident that occurred took place as a result of defense work taking place in World War II.

During those trying days, a number of scientists and researchers in the United States and England were looking for ways to improve British radar systems, which had come online in the early stages of the war. One promising piece of the Clemente had developed was called the magnetron, and it made use of microwaves to dramatically improve the sensitivity and effectiveness of radar waves.

Efforts were carried on for the next several years during the war to improve upon the initial magnetron design. Purely by accident, one of the researchers and engineers happened to be standing near a baggage on when it was turned on. He felt something warm in his shirt pocket and looked down to find his candy bar was rapidly melting. Naturally enough, the scientist became interested.

Taking several kernels of corn, Percy Spencer -- who was the American scientist that suffered the candy bar meltdown -- placed them in front of the magnetron and turned it on. Popcorn soon resulted, of course. Spencer decided to try other foods and eventually came to an egg, which he placed near the magnetron. It soon heated up and burst, unfortunately all over a fellow scientist's face.

Word spread throughout the defense contractor Spencer was working for, and the company put a number of its best engineers to work developing ways in which the magnetron could be used as a heating element in an oven. 1947 saw success, as engineers produced what came to be called, indeed, a microwave oven. It cost $5000, weighed three quarters of a ton and stood over 6 feet tall.

This defense contractor eventually licensed the technology to the Tappan Company, an American company which specialized in making stoves. Tappan introduced, in 1954, the first commercial microwave oven, which it marketed as the 'Radarange.' That name is still with us today. Costing $3000, it was a bit pricey, though another, much smaller, model costing $1200 was introduced in 1955. It didn't sell very well.

The microwave oven really took off in 1967, when the Amana Company -- which had purchased Tappan -- several years before introduced its own Radarange line of ovens. These compact, attractive and light weight units sold for about $500 initially. They became an instant hit, and by the last third of the 1970s microwaves were a presence in many homes due to their increasingly low prices.

Today, it would be a shock to walk into a home and not see a microwave oven of one kind or another. What most people don't know, however is that these microwave ovens were born of an accident due to the need to improve radar back during World War II. Had it not been for a wayward scientist and his melted candy bar it probably would've been several more years before the application would have been discovered.

Annie is an expert furniture and interior design writer. Her current area of specialism is  and desks, furniture sale  and dining furniture sale

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