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Review: Flash of Genius by John Seabrook

By Tom Simonite

24 September 2008

A PATENT dispute over the intermittent windshield wiper may not sound like ideal fodder for a major motion picture. But , opening next month in the US, will be worth seeing if it tells the story of inventor Robert Kearns as well as John Seabrook does in the title story of his from The New Yorker.

Driving in the rain in 1962, Kearns realised the wipers should be more like his eyelids: sweeping across the glass – and obscuring his view – only occasionally. He patented his design for these “blinking eye wipers” and…

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