Interesting post on Wired, Oct. 7, 1806: Do You Copy? Carbon Paper Patented, about Englishman Ralph Wedgwood, who received “the first patent for carbon paper.” But this case only shows that simultaneous invention is common, and that inventions usually come one way or the other. As the report notes, Wedgwood’s “work seems to duplicate that of Italian inventor Pellegrino Turri”:
Turri in Italy had by 1808 completed an early typewriting machine he had been working on for several years. It, too, was for use by the blind and relied on some form of carbon-impregnated paper. So, his work was more or less simultaneous with Wedgwood’s.
Also,
Scottish engineer James Watt, of steam-engine fame, had invented a tissue-copying process for business correspondence in 1779. But it required special inks and fluids and was a wet process for the user, so it didn’t catch on.
[AM cross-post]
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