Who invented the touchscreen?

Answer 1

DR.SAM HURST

Elographics, Inc. was founded by ten stockholders in March, 1971, to produce Graphical Data Digitizers for use in research and industrial applications, with the principal being Dr. Sam Hurst. He was on leave from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory to teach at the University of Kentucky for two years, where he was faced with a need to read a huge stack of strip chart data. It would have taken two graduate students approximately two months to do the task. He started thinking of a way to read the charts, and during the process, the "Elograph" (electronic graphics) coordinate measuring system and Elographics the company were born. The University of Kentucky Research Foundation applied for and was granted a patent on the Elograph. The Foundation granted an exclusive license to Elographics.

Dr. G. S. "Sam" Hurst (left), founder of Elographics, Inc. The Elograph was selected by Industrial Research

as one of the 100 Most Significant New Technical Products of the Year 1973.

In 1971, after returning to Oak Ridge, Dr. Hurst gathered nine friends from various areas of expertise to start a company to refine, manufacture and sell this new product. At this point Elographics truly began as a basement business. All work was done from three different basements; sensors in one, electronics in another, and cabinets in still another. The office was located in the home where the sensors were being built before moving to Four Oaks Center in February of 1972. The parts of the product were still being produced in basements at night and on weekends and brought to Four Oaks where they were assembled and shipped.

Elographics focused on research and scientific markets and produced products that met the specific needs of these markets. These needs included completely self-contained units with adjustable scale factors, decimal readouts, and interfaces to computers and many calculators. The digitizer products were used worldwide in a variety of applications including research, medicine and quality control.

Answer 2

Doctor Sam Hurst (founder of Elographics)