Eli H. Janney



Eli Hamilton Janney (November 12, 1831 – June 16, 1912) was the inventor of the modern knuckle coupler that replaced link and pin couplers on North American railroads.

Biography
He was born in 1831 to Daniel Janney and Elizabeth Avis Haines in Loudoun County, Virginia. He studied briefly at a seminary. He married Cornelia Hamilton (1833–1889).

In the American Civil War, Janney achieved the rank of major for the Confederate States of America, and served on the staff of General Robert E. Lee.

After the war, he was a dry goods clerk in Alexandria, Virginia; he spent many of his lunches whittling his concept out of a block of wood for a replacement to the railroads' link and pin couplers that were in wide use. On April 1, 1873, Janney filed for a patent titled "Improvement in Car-Couplings" describing the knuckle-style couplers that are in use on railroads today. He was awarded on April 29, 1873.

He died on June 16, 1912, in Alexandria, Virginia and was buried in Ivy Hill Cemetery. The City of Alexandria named one of their streets in his honor, Janney's Lane.

Janney's coupler and the Westinghouse air brake are generally regarded as being the two most significant safety inventions in U.S. railroads between the end of the Civil War and 1900.

Patents awarded

 * Improved Car Coupling, April 21, 1868
 * Improvement in Car-Couplings April 29, 1873
 * Improvement in Car-Couplings October 20, 1874
 * Improvement in Car-Platforms August 20, 1878
 * Improvement in Car-Coupling Draw-Bars August 27, 1876
 * Improvement in Car-Couplings February 25, 1879
 * Improvement in Car-Buffers April 8, 1879
 * Improvement in Car-Buffers May 13, 1879