Humdinger Pump

Unless you have at least sixty years of life experiences under your belt you probably are unfamiliar with the word, 'humdinger.' However, a real humdinger was a very popular phrase during the 70s and '30s. It was used to describe anything that was 'better than average,' from a team of mules to a farm tractor. Unfortunately, this manner of describing numerous items and situations dwindled into obscurity along with the gas engine in the late 1940s. The phrase 'a real humdinger' was not a problem for the Carter Pump Company of Hackensack, New Jersey, as they 'dubbed' their small water pumping outfit (see photo #1) as a 'humdinger.' Research does not reveal exactly how many years these pumps were manufactured and sold.

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History of Pumps

1830 Modern screw pump is invented by Revillion.
1845 Henry R. Worthington invents the first direct-acting steam pumping engine. Worthington Pump designed its first products to power canal boats and U.S. naval vessels. Worthington later pioneered pump designs for boiler feed, oil pipeline and hydro-electric applications.
1848 In Seneca Falls, N.Y., Seabury S. Gould purchases the interests of Edward Mynderse and H.C. Silsby in Downs, Mynderse & Co., forming Downs & Co., later known as Goulds Manufacturing Company.
1849 Goulds casts and assembles the world's first all-metal pump.
1851 British inventor John Appold introduces the curved vane centrifugal pump.

1857 Worthington produces the first horizontal, duplex, direct-acting steam pumps for boiler feed.
1859 Jacob Edson invents the diaphragm pump and founds the Edson Corporation in Boston, Mass., to manufacture and sell his pump.
1860 Adam Cameron founds the Cameron Steam Pump Works, and becomes another pioneer in reciprocating steam pump engines. Like Worthington, Cameron's first products were used to power merchant marine and U.S. naval vessels. Cameron pumps were later applied in water resources, oil pipeline and refining and boiler feed.
1868 Stork Pompen of Hengelo, Netherlands, pioneers the concrete volute pump for water drainage.1869 Downs & Company changes its name to Goulds Manufacturing Company. 
1870 UK Professor Osborne Reynolds develops an original design of a centrifugal pump.
1871 Johannes Klein receives a patent on his “boiler feed apparatus.” With Friedrich Schanzlin and Jakob Becker, he founds the company “Frankenthaler Maschinen- & Armatur-Fabrik Klein, Schanzlin & Becker” (now known as KSB) to manufacture boiler feed equipment and valves.
1874 Charles Barnes of New Brunswick invents the vane pump.
1874 Wilson-Snyder grows into the premier line of slurry, pipeline and refinery pumps. 

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