Who Invented The Digger Derrick Truck?

Everyone knows who invented the light bulb, but who invented the diggerderrick?

The digger derrick is just as important to lighting upAmerica's homes as the light bulb, unlike the light bulb most Americanscouldn't even identify a digger derrick. . . much less tell you anythingabout who invented it or what its used for. What's a Digger Derrick? Digger derrick trucks are specialized utility trucks that wereoriginally designed for digging holes and setting electrical poles.

Theyhave an auger mounted on the end of a boom that's used to drill theholes. Once the hole is drilled, the boom can be used to help anoperator position a heavy electrical pole in the hole. While diggerderrick trucks are used for many other applications today, this job isthe one that the machines were originally invented to accomplish. So Who Invented the Digger Derrick? The first digger derrick was made in 1945 by TEREX Utilities.

Theycalled their invention the Tel-E-Lect product, named after the telephoneand electrical industries that it was designed to serve. A photographof the original digger derrick , and a timeline showing how the original model was improved over the years, can be found on the TEREX Utilities web site. How Did Digger Derricks Help Light Up America? Though life without electricity is hard for most Americans today toimagine, there was a time not so long ago that electricity wasn't asaccessible to Americans as it is today.

In the 1940s, holes forelectrical poles were dug the old fashioned way by crews of men armedwith shovels. With the advent of the digger derrick, a small crew couldaccomplish the same amount of work in a single day that a it would havetaken a large crew weeks to do by hand. Now that you know how these machines helped fuel an electricalrevolution in the United States, think of some other obscure machinesthat are often taken for granted. Who do you suppose invented them, whatproblems are they solving for us today, and what would life be likewithout them?

There's something fascinating to be learned about eachmachine's place in history, and the digger derrick is no exception.

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