useless knowledge

The Patent Office was the only major government building to survive the British invasion of Washington, D.C. during the War of 1812. This is credited to office Superintendent Dr. William Thornton, who was building a musical instrument in the same building. He persuaded British officers that they would be destroying the shared intellectual record of mankind if the patents were burned. Nevertheless, a disastrous fire occurred on December 15, 1836, when the patents were in temporary storage while a new (more fireproof) facility was being built. A fire station was located next to the temporary storage facility, but the hoses and pumps were frozen, and the firemen were unable to prevent the loss. All patent records were lost, since no backups were stored anywhere else.

It is estimated that 9957 patents had been issued up until that point. An effort was made to recreate the listings, but only about 2800 of the original patents have been recovered. For the most part, only the inventors' own records were able to provide any proof.