On August 13, 1889, Hanson Goodrich of Illinois received a U.S. patent for his “coffee pot,” which is better known as the stove-top percolator.
Goodrich’s brilliant, highly innovative design completely revolutionized the morning routines of millions of working-class families by transforming coffee brewing from a crude, muddy art into a clean, predictable science. Prior to his 1889 patent, early American coffee was typically prepared by simply boiling loose grounds directly in water, resulting in a bitter, over-extracted brew filled with sediment. Goodrich engineered a specialized central metal tube and a perforated basket that utilized the physical power of boiling steam to continuously cycle water upward and filter it down through the grounds, single-handedly inventing the modern, rich visual vocabulary of the American breakfast table.
