🔗 Share this article Can You Solve It? That Forgotten Netherlands Invention That Shaped the Modern World One can find numerous candidates for the title of “planet’s greatest innovation.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine. According to a new book, though, that honor belongs to a mechanised sawmill invented through Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593. “Prior to mechanised sawing, constructing a modest merchant vessel required around 10 lumberjacks laboring for 90 days,” notes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-driven lumber mills, the same amount of processed timber might be produced in less than a week.” Owing to this speedy automated cutter, which turned logs into boards using almost no human effort, Dutch builders were able to construct vessels more quickly than anyone else, which sparked one hundred years of Dutch naval, economic and artistic dominance in the continent and the world. The Original Genuine Industrial Machine The inventor's lumber mill, contends Dávila, represented “humanity’s first authentic factory apparatus.” A windmill rotated a wheel. A single part converted the rotary movement into vertical motion to power the saw. Another component transformed the spinning motion into a lateral movement feeding the timber to the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the wood ahead one precise increment per cycle. “Each element was modest on its own. The Dutchman’s genius was to integrate them in order that the machine acted in a perfectly controlled sequence, cutting on every descending stroke while moving with each upward stroke. This constituted a remarkably clever use of basic components.” Which brings us to today’s puzzle. I’d like you to reinvent a key the fundamental ideas underpinning this historic machine. Round and Up Design a mechanism that turns circular movement to up-and-down motion. You have these components exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “sleeve”, that is a cylinder or housing through which one of the rods will fit snugly. (Consider that you can put things on a stand, so the components do not fall down.) I’ll be back at 5pm UK time with the solution. In the interim, NO SPOILERS. Instead, feel free to suggest (non obvious) candidates for the planet’s greatest creation.