the first microwave oven was placed for testing at howland, maine.
the first microwave oven was placed for testing at howland, maine.
where was the first microwave oven placed for testing?
howland, maine
in 1945, the specific heating effect of a high-power microwave beam was accidentally discovered by percy spencer, an american self-taught engineer from howland, maine. employed by raytheon at the time, he noticed that microwaves from an active radar set he was working on started to melt a chocolate bar he had in his pocket. the first food deliberately cooked with spencer's microwave was popcorn, and the second was an egg, which exploded in the face of one of the experimenters. to verify his finding, spencer created a high density electromagnetic field by feeding microwave power from a magnetron into a metal box from which it had no way to escape. when food was placed in the box with the microwave energy, the temperature of the food rose rapidly. on 8 october 1945, raytheon filed a united states patent application for spencer's microwave cooking process, and an oven that heated food using microwave energy from a magnetron was soon placed in a boston restaurant for testing.
microwave oven
the development of the cavity magnetron made possible the production of electromagnetic waves of a small enough wavelength (microwaves). american engineer percy spencer is generally credited with inventing the modern microwave oven after world war ii from radar technology developed during the war. named the "radarange", it was first sold in 1946. raytheon later licensed its patents for a home-use microwave oven that was first introduced by tappan in 1955, but these units were still too large and expensive for general home use. sharp corporation introduced the first microwave oven with a turntable between 1964 and 1966. the countertop microwave oven was first introduced in 1967 by the amana corporation. after sharp introduced low-cost microwave ovens affordable for residential use in the late 1970s, their use spread into commercial and residential kitchens around the world. in addition to their use in cooking food, microwave ovens are used for heating in many industrial processes.
microwave oven