Got a wiper?

In 1903, driving in the winter meant one thing.

You drove a mile...

pulled over in the freezing sleet...

wiped your windshield by hand...

got back in the car...

and drove another mile.

Everyone did it.

No one questioned it.

That's how it worked.

One day, a woman named Mary Anderson was riding in a streetcar in New York City.

She watched the driver lean out into the cold trying to see through the snow.

So she came up with something simple.

A rubber blade on a lever.

A way to clear the windshield without stopping.

She had invented the windshield wiper.

People laughed.

They said it would distract the driver.

One manufacturer told her the idea had no value.

So nothing changed.

People kept pulling over every mile in the freezing rain.

For years.

Mary Anderson looked at the same problem everyone else saw.

She was one of the few people who questioned it.