Purchasing old magazines is yet another passion. Finding them in good order and minus the musty odor, these magazines are a colorful glimpse into women’s lives of earlier generations. Like a diary, the monthly magazines chronicled the details of daily life with recipes, advice, fiction, humor, diet and make-up tips, crafts, travel and fantasy.
have filled. As incentive to send in your suggestion, the magazine paid $5.00 if yours was published.
Mrs. S.J. Althaus earned $5.00 with her suggestion that someone “Invent a device to hold your head in place, so it does not wobble from side to side, while you are asleep on a long journey in a bus, train or plane.” Twenty-one years later, Doris Sweeney and Mary Ellen Lee tired of their own heads bobbling and jolting them awake, and in 1971, received a patent for their invention, the Contoured Travel Pillow
Mrs. E. Penno wished fervently that someone “Invent a pillow that either absorbs the snorer’s snores or vibrates and awakens him!” Thirty-two years it took until this woman’s prayers were answered in 1988 by a trio of Japanese inventors and their vibrating snoring deterrent pillow
What’s so astonishing is how long it took for these obvious inventions to come about, especially the controured travel pillow. On occasion, haven’t we all wished “someone would invent…” as a solution to a predicament? 
On my own, however, a baby strapped to my chest and a definant, almost two-year old breaking free of the umbrella’s straps and running into traffic, had me wishing for a contraption that would restrain both a baby and a toddler. To The American Magazine, I’d have submitted this need: “Why doesn’t someone build a dual kiddie carrier that’s half a pram and half a stroller?”
Twenty-three years later, Michael D. Williams must have answered his wife’s prayers and applied for a patent to protect his invention of a dual infant and child carrier in the shape of a stork.
This updated version is so colorful and beautifully designed – if only it came adult sized, so I
could give my big boyz a push around the block, as I would have so loved when they were my babies .
Those who submitted “a need” to The American Home column would today be in their eighties. Should Mrs. Althaus still be around, I can imagine her telling everyone that the u-shaped travel neck pillow was her idea.
xxea