A patent on ‘Birth of a Child By Centrifugal Force’
On November 9 1965, the Blonskys were granted US Patent 3,216,423, for an Apparatus for Facilitating the Birth of a Child by Centrifugal Force. The drawings, as well as the text, are a revelation. The Patent Office has them online at http://tinyurl.com/jd4ra and I urge you – if you have any shred of curiosity in your body – to look them up. For conceiving what appears to be the greatest labour-saving device ever invented, George and Charlotte Blonsky won the 1999 Ig Nobel Prize in the field of Managed Health Care.
This is utterly bananas. (via christ)(tags: via:christ crazy patents 1960s centrifuge birth medicine ignobels)