The vacuum cleaner has come a long way from where it began. The first machine that remotely resembled a vacuum was called a “sweeping machine,” invented by Ives McGaffey. It was an unwieldy device that had to be cranked while pushing it around.

The next version was a horse-drawn gasoline-powered floor-cleaning device. Unlike a vacuum, however, it used pressurized air to blast dirt into a receptacle. The inventor, John Thurman, later lost a patent lawsuit because his device was not a “vacuum” but an air-blowing machine.

Perhaps the first true motorized vacuum was designed by a man named Hubert Cecil Booth. Booth was a British engineer who, perhaps inspired by John Thurman’s work, developed a horse-drawn machine. However, Booth’s was very different from Thurman’s.

Booth’s machine actually vacuumed (sucked up) dirt from the floor. It was a very large machine driven by petrol. The machine had long hoses that were pulled in through the windows of a home to vacuum each room.

The machine was not nearly as efficient as today’s vacuums, but it worked to some degree. He demonstrated his machine in a restaurant the year he got his patent, 1901, and amazed onlookers as the machine sucked up dirt. Today, central vacuum systems and upright vacuums alike owe a nod to the invention of Hubert Cecil Booth.