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Inventors
Cash Register - James Ritty
The Incorruptible Cashier
 
 More of James Ritty and Cash Registers.
James Ritty - Biography
James Ritty, inventor of the first working version of a mechanical cash register, was born in Dayton, Ohio in 1837.
More on James Ritty
Our inventor James Ritty was quite the cowboy.
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Credit Cards and Money
Shopping Innovations
By Mary Bellis

On January 30, 1883, James Ritty and John Birch received a patent for inventing the cash register. James Ritty invented what was nicknamed the "Incorruptible Cashier" or the first working, mechanical cash register. His invention came with that familiar bell sound referred to in advertising as "The Bell Heard Round the World". 

After reading a description of the cash register designed by James Ritty and sold by the National Manufacturing Company, John H. Patterson decided to buy both the company and the patent. He renamed the company the National Cash Register Company in 1884.

John Patterson improved the cash register by adding a paper roll to record sales transactions.

Charles F. Kettering designed a cash register with an electric motor in 1906, while working at the National Cash Register Company. He later worked at General Motors and invented an electric self-starter (ignition) for a Cadillac.

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