Last time on the Central Alarm blog we took a step way, way back and looked at the history of the foundation of all security measures: the Lock. With an early example in ancient Assyria up through the additions of Romans and later developments (or lack thereof) of the Middle Ages. Now we’re going to make a big hop, skip, and leap forward to the last few hundred years that saw a new wave of innovation hit the locksmithing trade.
The late 18th century saw the Industrial Revolution hit in a big way. With it came precise engineeringand standardization of parts. And so, naturally, lock and key mechanisms became increasingly complex. Here is a quick rundown of just a few of those. The lever tumbler lock, made in 1778 by Robert Barron, then Jeremiah Chubb came in 1818 and turned that into a Chubb detector lock that added security measures to alert the owner if it had been tampered with. Chubb’s brother Charles joined the outfit and created a lock company, continuing to innovate on their design and adding new security features. Linus Yale, Sr. created the first pin tumbler lock in 1848. Not ten years later James Sargent introduced the first of two new lock tyes to the world. The first combination lock in 1857 and the first time lock mechanism, said to have been built from three eight-day clocks, in 1873. Finally, in 1924 Harry Soref created the first padlock. Each locksupplanting the one before it in turn as everyone worked to make the most secure device possible.
All sorts of locks came to be in a rapid span of time thanks to the Industrial Revolution, seeing the devices explode from their simple warded and pin ancestors to the devices we use to secure our homes, cars, lockers and work spaces. We hope you’ve found this very brief overview interesting. Next time let’s jump to the future of security!
