Today I found all kinds of goodies. A real patent from 1926 that's actually a smart piece of engineering, sitting on the same day as a political cartoon that hasn't aged a day, and an "instructive" toy that's genuinely startling.
The Floating Pool
The Springfield Leader and Press, August 1, 1926
William H. Curtis, of West Baden, Indiana, patented a real fix for a real problem. Many rivers near populated areas weren't safe to swim in, muddy bottoms, dangerous currents, drop-offs nobody could see coming until it was too late. His solution: two pontoons floating on the water, connected at each end, with a bathing enclosure suspended between them.
U.S. Patent 1,583,127, "Portable Adjustable Bathing Structure," Fig. 1, full assembly view
Patent Fig. 2 and Fig. 3, end elevation and bottom view
The floor of the enclosure was made of wooden slats spaced apart, letting the current flow straight through and keep the whole pool naturally clean, no pump, no filter required. A hand crank could raise or lower the entire enclosure to adjust the depth for adults or children, and if the water level changed or the spot stopped working, the whole structure could simply be towed somewhere new.
A hundred years later, floating docks and portable pool platforms are solving this exact same problem, just with an engine doing the towing instead of two men on a windlass.