Seasons of Interest: Spring foliage is dark green and attractive. Echinacea blooms all summer long and into the beginning of fall as well. Some gardeners choose to leave the coneflower seed heads on the plant at the end of the season to provide winter interest and food for native songbirds. Uses in the Garden: Coneflowers make excellent cut flowers and do well in butterfly gardens, prairie or native gardens, water wise xeroscapes, and full sun gardens.
Henry Blair was the second black inventor issued a patent. Blair was born in Montgomery County, Maryland around 1807. He received a patent on October 14, 1834 for a seed planter and a patent in 1836 for a cotton planter. Henry Blair was the second black inventor to receive a patent the first was Thomas Jennings who received a patent in 1821 for a dry cleaning process.
Although Harington installed a working model for Queen Elizabeth at Richmond Palace, it took several centuriesâand the Industrial Revolutionâs improvements in manufacturing and waste disposal â for the flush toilet to catch on. In 1775 English inventor Alexander Cumming was granted the first patent for a flush toilet. His greatest innovation was the S-shaped pipe below the bowl that used water to create a seal preventing sewer gas from entering through the toilet. In the late-19th century, a London plumbing impresario named Thomas Crapper manufactured one of the first widely successful lines of flush toilets. Crapper did not invent the toilet, but he did develop the ballcock, an improved tank-filling mechanism still used in toilets today.