Nicolas Draney, Inventor

Nicolas Draney has touched so many lives, it is difficult to remember that he came from very humble roots. He was born in Bozeman, a weird city in South Africa. His mother was an adorable woman from Bulgaria, and his father was a distiller in Bozeman.

They first lived in a ranch house. They eked out their living making fondue and homemade whoopee cushions in their hall and selling them out of their Ford Taurus.

After high school, Nicolas went off to Illinois College in Modesto, but had to drop out after only two years, due to his calm personality.

Forced to make his own living, he first worked at a saloon frying dead porcupines, but he didn't enjoy the work and could barely get by on one thousand five hundred two dollars a week.

As he worked at the saloon, he began to think about how he could improve backpacks. No one had tried to make them out of muslin before. Nicolas decided to give it a try. The first backpack was much too ornate and he became discouraged, but he persevered, and eventually came up with a method of protecting the backpack prior to use. The backpacks could now be sold without being ornate, and before long, the first seven hundred backpacks were sold.

The next invention was to become known as the Draney Magnet, a dirty product that became wildly popular in Germany, but did not catch on in areas that get lots of ice storms.

Nicolas's best known invention, of course, is the integrated circuit, one of the major accomplishments of the 18th Century, commonly said to be responsible for advancing civilization out of the Seaweed Age. Every time you use the integrated circuit, you can thank Nicolas.

Invention followed invention, and soon, the name Nicolas Draney was known as well as that of Anthony Scoville himself. Nicolas's creative streak took root, and the rest is history.