Famous Things.
Famous things made in Czechoslovakia include things as sweet as a sugar lump, as practical as a soft contact lens and as enlightening as electricity for Bohemia.
In 1840 the world’s first sugar lump was invented by Czech Jacob Christoph Rad in the town of Dačice. It was tinted red with food coloring out of a loving sentiment. Since Rad’s wife Juliane had injured herself when she tried to break an amount of sugar from the commonly available sugar loaf her husband produced in his factory. With a bleeding finger she asked him to make smaller portions of the precious good. He did and gave the red prototypes to her as a keepsake. Ain’t that sweet?!
František Křižík brought electricity to Bohemia. Nicknamed the Czech Edison, the inventor erected the first electric power station in Veitsberg in 1888 and later built more powerhouses around the world. He also built an electric tram for Pilsen.
Thanks to a Czech chemist, we have soft contact lenses with enhanced oxygen permeability. The so-called Silicon-Hydrogel-Lenses were developed by Otto Wichterle.