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I was watching a piece on a Sunday-morning news show about denim jeans, and it got me wondering whether (a) the US has ever produced a more iconic product -- one that is ubiquitous and widely admired (and copied) worldwide -- than denim jeans, and (b) whether those of you from other countries can boast of similar global success for one of your cultural products.
Yes, I know most blue jeans are made outside the US nowadays, and I know the word "denim" is of French origin, and I know Levi Strauss was a German Jew. But is there anything more quintessentially American than a well-worn pair of blue jeans?
Denim is more than a French word. It was a French tissue used by French peasants a long time before American used it.
But yeah, the way we used and make this tissue now, to make jeans, is completely American. And maybe the most iconic American product with sodas and hamburgers (which existed too, but not in the same scale).
OK, so atomic energy and space flight were not American inventions because Teller was Hungarian and Bohr was Danish and Fermi was Italian and Von Braun and Einstein were German, etc etc.
Americans believe that Ford invented the automobile and Eastman invented photography, and Edison invented everything electric,and Fulton invented the steamboat, and Morse invented the telegraph, and Al Gore invented the internet, just out of the blue, completely unaware of any similar work or research that had ever been done by anybody else in the world. The famous American Pastor Weems school-book mythology.
It's not merely about Bell being Scottish. He built and patented the telephone in the U.S. while living and working in the U.S. He eventually became a U.S. citizen having never become a Canadian citizen (Something that wasn't available until after his death). His only connection to Canada is that he lived there occasionally and retired/died there.
They conducted a poll on the greatest Canadian. Alexander Graham Bell came in at #9. They conducted a poll on the greatest Canadian invention. The telephone came in at #2. Bell was never a citizen of Canada and the telephone wasn't invented there.
You didn't care to corroborate that your list of Canadian inventions were accurate or not. Amazingly, immediately after pointing fingers at Americans for stealing inventions, marketing it, and tooting its horn about it, you posted an inaccurate list of inventions (stealing inventions) being promoted (marketed) through a contest searching for the greatest Canadian invention (tooting its horn).
People, people. I know we all love to claim Alexander Graham Bell as the inventor of the telephone.
He and his parents immigrated to Ontario in Canada. His work with the deaf got him work in Boston, where he worked on his telephone. He married an American ( who was deaf ) and became an American citizen.
He did not became Canadian because Canadian citizenship didn't exist then, he was a British subject, so claiming he's Canadian is partly correct since he was as Canadian as a resident of Canada could be at that time.
He had more than just a passing interest in Canada, his parents lived here and he visited often. In fact the very first long distance call, of six miles, occurred in Canada, from Brantford, Ontario to Paris, Ontario. So it is obvious Bell was doing major work in Canada.
His chosen place of retirement was also in Cape Breton, where he continued working on many inventions .
He and his wife are buried in Canada, at Beinn Bhreagh, in Nova Scotia.
So we ALL can claim him as our own. Just because he wasn't able to get a citizenship that did not exist, really does not make him less Canadian than American. His actions and choices of where to live and die prove that.
People, people. I know we all love to claim Alexander Graham Bell as the inventor of the telephone.
He and his parents immigrated to Ontario in Canada. His work with the deaf got him work in Boston, where he worked on his telephone. He married an American ( who was deaf ) and became an American citizen.
He did not became Canadian because Canadian citizenship didn't exist then, he was a British subject, so claiming he's Canadian is partly correct since he was as Canadian as a resident of Canada could be at that time.
He had more than just a passing interest in Canada, his parents lived here and he visited often. In fact the very first long distance call, of six miles, occurred in Canada, from Brantford, Ontario to Paris, Ontario. So it is obvious Bell was doing major work in Canada.
His chosen place of retirement was also in Cape Breton, where he continued working on many inventions .
He and his wife are buried in Canada, at Beinn Bhreagh, in Nova Scotia.
So we ALL can claim him as our own. Just because he wasn't able to get a citizenship that did not exist, really does not make him less Canadian than American. His actions and choices of where to live and die prove that.
He was 23 and university educated before he left Scotland. He was Scottish.
It's not merely about Bell being Scottish. He built and patented the telephone in the U.S. while living and working in the U.S. He eventually became a U.S. citizen having never become a Canadian citizen (Something that wasn't available until after his death). His only connection to Canada is that he lived there occasionally and retired/died there.
They conducted a poll on the greatest Canadian. Alexander Graham Bell came in at #9. They conducted a poll on the greatest Canadian invention. The telephone came in at #2. Bell was never a citizen of Canada and the telephone wasn't invented there.
You didn't care to corroborate that your list of Canadian inventions were accurate or not. Amazingly, immediately after pointing fingers at Americans for stealing inventions, marketing it, and tooting its horn about it, you posted an inaccurate list of inventions (stealing inventions) being promoted (marketed) through a contest searching for the greatest Canadian invention (tooting its horn).
Well, he did IMMIGRATE to Canada with his parents. He did visit more than just a few times….do a little research on that one will you?
He chose to live in Canada in a place he had started visiting in 1899 until his death in 1922. That is more than just a passing interest in a place.
He also did some of his major work in Nova Scotia. He had a COMPLEX there working on his various ideas.
Your dismissal of Canada and the role it played in this mans life is terribly misinformed.
Brazil: coffee, cachaça, soap-operas, Embraer aeroplanes, sugarcane-based ethanol fuel... I think it's all.
Havaianas
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