Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 88.djvu/784

 Little Inventions to Make Life Easy

Why Weren't They Thought of Before?

���Finger-Ring to Be Used as a Pencil-Holder

A V-SHAPED spring clip is attached to a fin- ger-ring, and is used to hold a pen- cil in a convenient place so that the user will not have to search for a mis- ■' laid pencil con- stantly and yet leaves the hand free.

This Grease- Cup Keeps Your Hands Clean

TO obviate the necessity of removing thegrease cup when it is de- sired to fill it with grease, an inven- tor has inserted in the cup a washer which acts as a plunger to force out the grease. This washer runs on a screw-threaded stem, which is operated by a thumb-screw in the head of the cup.

A Clothes-Pin with a Sandow Grip

A clothes-pin has been pat- ented with a grip sufificiently firm to resist the strongest wind. On the wire or rope used for drying the clothes, is attached a ring which projects downward, and terminates in two short arms similar to the blades of a pair of scissors, but having corrugated surfaces for gripping the clothes. Above the pivot the outer surfaces of the arms are also corrugated to engage a ring nut, which can be tightened when fastening the pin on the clothes.

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��Keeping the Heat Out of Milk- Cans MILK- CAN

���especially de- signed to keep out heat is the latest improvement in dairy appliances. It consists in real- ity of two cans, one within the other. The space between them is filled with felt, ground cork or other heat-insulating material.

An Electric Whirlpool to Suck Flies to Their Doom

THE latest fly- killing engine is a small motor encased in a han- dle with a cord which attaches to an ordinary elec- tric socket. The motor operates a miniature electric fan placed eccentrically in the open end of the handle. Air is sucked in and swirled around the circumference of the casing and forced out through a bent tube ending in a screened trap. Insects coming within reach of the "deadly wind " are sucked in and killed.

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��Counting Up on Steel Fingers

N improve- ment on the

��old method of counting on one's fingers is a new device having sev- eral strips of steel pivoted at one end. At the "finger tips," are written the names of the various articles which are usually sent to the laundry, such as "shirts," "handkerchiefs," and "col- lars." On each "finger" is mounted a slide which may be quickly moved to register the number of pieces.

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