1858–1937 
INVENTOR UNITED STATES
The only practical way to keep the ears from freezing when exposed to such weather as all the northern states are liable to at certain seasons, is to cover them up; but this is easier said than done, or at least it was until Greenwood’s Champion Ear Protectors were invented.
—1889 DESCRIPTION OF THE FARMINGTON MANUFACTURING COMPANY IN LEADING BUSINESS MEN OF LEWISTON, AUGUSTA AND VICINITY
Chester excitedly laced up his new ice skates and glided onto the glassy surface of Abbott Pond. It was an especially cold, windy day in Farmington, Maine, so there were no other children ice skating, but Chester didn’t care. He wasn’t going to let a little cold weather keep him from trying out his new ice skates.
Before long, though, Chester’s ears were stinging with pain from the cold. He hated wearing fur caps—they didn’t fit well, and the chin strap made him look like a little boy. He was fifteen, basically a man, and he did not want people to think he was a boy anymore. He rubbed his mittened hands over his ears, but that didn’t help. Then he took his scarf off and wrapped it around his head. This can’t look good, he thought. Besides, the scarf was way too big to be comfortable, and it made his head itch. Defeated, Chester trudged home.
That night, Chester’s brain was whirring with ideas to solve his problem. He found a piece of wire and started bending it into an arc that would fit over his head. Then he bent the ends into circles about the size of his ears.
“Grandmother,” he said. “Could you sew some fur on this so I can use it as ear protectors?” The first earmuffs had been made!
Chester Greenwood was born in December of 1858 in Maine, where New England winters can be bitingly cold. His father, Zina, built bridges, wagons, and carriages, so Chester and his brothers were constantly inspired to create and build.
Even though Chester never finished elementary school, he was a strong supporter of education. All four of his children went to college.
From an early age, Chester was a businessperson. He sold the eggs his family’s chicken laid and then used the money to buy candy, which he then marked up—raised the price—and sold to his neighbors.
Less than three years after that cold winter’s day in 1873, Chester had acquired a patent for Greenwood’s Champion Ear Protectors. The patent protected his design so nobody else could use it without paying him. Then he set to work improving his design with an adjustable steel band and hinges so the earmuffs could be folded up and fit in a pocket. He designed machinery to mass produce the earmuffs, and at age twenty-two, Chester made a display about his product and the production process to show at the state fair. Hundreds of people saw his display there, and it paid off not only because he won a medal, but also because by 1883, he was selling thirty thousand pairs of earmuffs a year. Chester continued to sell more and more earmuffs every year until his death in 1937, when he sold four hundred thousand!
Chester’s ingenuity didn’t stop at ear warmers, though. At that time, steam heating was very popular. Basically, a big furnace called a steam boiler had a fire going in the basement of a building and sent hot steam through pipes up to the all the rooms in the building. The downfall of this system, though, was that it was difficult to control the temperature, and it could be dangerous, sometimes starting fires in the building. Chester produced Florida Boilers, a more effective and safe furnace for steam heating.
Chester was proud to be a Farmington resident and worked to make it a nice place to live. He joined a committee to improve roads in the town, and he and his wife were active in the church, the Grange, and the Odd Fellows lodge. Perhaps most impressive, Chester employed almost a fourth of the town at his factory, Farmington Manufacturing Company.
Many of Chester’s inventions weren’t patented. He had a reputation in the area for his ability to build machines that solved problems, so often farmers and other folks in the community would come to him when they had a problem. Chester would think about it for a day or two and then build whatever machine was needed to help his friends out. Some of the machines he developed for other companies produced things like rolling pins and tool handles, while others were more complicated, like the wood boring machine. His mousetrap called the Mechanical Cat was in high demand at local hotels, his doughnut hook was perfect for pulling doughnuts out of hot cooking oil, and his shock absorber helped inspire the design for today’s airplane landing gear.
In the late 1890s, Chester started Franklin County’s first phone company, Franklin Telephone & Telegraph. He even manufactured all the equipment for it! People joked, though, that they had to remove their Greenwood Ear Protectors before they could hear very well on Chester’s phone system.
When he was sixty, Chester was tired of the front edge of his tea kettle always wearing out. He, like most people, had a habit of simply tilting the kettle forward to pour water out of the spout and into a cup. This led to extra pressure on that part of the kettle, though, and that’s where it always wore out first. Chester decided to fix his problem by adding a leg that extended horizontally out from the bottom of the kettle, under the spout. This supported the kettle as he poured his hot water, and his kettle bottom lasted much longer. When he started selling this product, it—like the earmuffs—was a big hit.
The last invention Chester patented was a spring-tooth rake, made of steel. We still use rakes like this today when we rake grass, sand, and soil.
Every inventor has a list of inventions that didn’t succeed. Chester Greenwood’s list includes the cotton picker and the advertising match box.
Though Chester patented 130 inventions—and created many more—he’s most remembered for his first, the ear protector. Every year in Farmington, Maine, the whole town salutes Chester’s contributions to the community and the country. December 21 is Chester Greenwood Day, and the first Saturday in December is celebrated with a parade in which everyone and everything—even the cars and the animals!—wears earmuffs. The Smithsonian Institute named Chester one of America’s fifteen outstanding inventors.
I will rock the world by becoming an architect. I will design bigger, better, and definitely safer buildings. I will design them to help the environment so that they don’t pollute the air as much as other buildings do. I also want to be the first person to design underwater living environments so that there won’t be as many people crammed onto one continent. I will also design buildings for people who are less fortunate, and I will do my best to listen to other people’s ideas when designing new buildings.
KEVIN WALKER 
AGE 11