On this day in 1882 Clark Brown was granted the patent for CEPHALOMETER. U.S. Patent No. 268,614.
This patent is designed to take measurements of the human head for phrenology, ethnology, anthropology, and sculptures. The measurements are taken of all portions of the head with relation to the central point of the head corresponding with the head of the spinal column.
Cephalometry is the study of the human head. Anthropologists, doctors, and scientists have been using Cephalometry for hundreds of years. Anthropologists use it to measure a skull and based on the measurements and other assessments could determine the time period of the skull, the sex of the skull as well as the ethnicity of the skull. Doctors would use the measurements of a baby’s head in utero to discover whether or not the baby had a large and soft head. This finding would determine the difficulty of the pending labor.
