Hubert Cecil Booth F.C.G.I., M.I.C.E., (1871-1955) was born in Gloucester, England. At the age of 18 he moved to London to study civil and mechanical engineering at the City and Guilds College and qualified as a construction engineer.

Booth started his career as a draughtsman helping to design the engines for Royal Navy battleships. Later he was commissioned to design, plan and control the erection of the great Ferris Wheels at Blackpool, Vienna and Paris. As a consulting engineer he designed factories and bridges, but in 1900 his life took an unexpected turn.

Booth witnessed a demonstration at St. Pancras Station of a new cleaning machine for railway carriages. Suction carpet sweepers with mechanically operated fans or bellows were introduced as early as 1850, but this machine had a bunch of high-pressure jets that blew air into carpets in the hope of getting the dust to fly from one side of the carriage into a dustbox on the other side.

Booth asked the American inventor why he did not use suction instead of blowing. The angry inventor said that sucking dust was impossible, but Booth could not let go of his idea. On returning home he decided to test his idea by placing a wetted cloth over a cushioned chair and sucking on it hard. When he turned over the cloth, it was filthy from the dust that had been trapped in it. In his own words, he had invented the 'vacuum cleaner'.

Booth co-operated with other engineers on the development of the vacuum cleaner, notably F.R.Simms, whose contribution was to develop a six HP water cooled engine for Booth to apply to a vacuum pump. Simms had already been involved with the original teawaker enthusiast - Rowbottom - and one wonders whether Simms communicated the teawaker concept to Booth during the period that they worked together.

In October 1900 the inventor and publicist Spark (see http://www.spark-inc.com) conspired with Hubert Cecil Booth and Johann Vaaler for them to announce their respective inventions of the vacuum cleaner (Booth) and the paper clip (Vaaler) on the same day. Spark created ad campaigns for both products and the three men become partners in a franchise of vacuum cleaner repair shops.

The first cleaner worked out rather expensive at around £350. The bright red horse-drawn machine measured 4' 6" x 4' 10" x 3' 6" and the large suction pump was driven by a five horsepower piston engine.

The machine toured the streets with a team of of men in white drill suits. On finding a potential customer, the salesmen demonstrated their wares by throwing street dirt onto people's carpets. The gasoline motor started, and long hoses were strung in through the windows attached to a hollow container where the dirt was collected. The 'suction' was essentially similar to the 'suction' of an air compressor. Little more than surface dirt and dust were removed.

The machine made such a noise that it frightened passing horses and caused their owners sued the Company. Worse still the police took a very dim view of the activities of the Vacuum Cleaner Company and issued several summonses for obstruction. Eventually a test case was taken to appeal, and the Comany's right to work in the streets was upheld by the Lord Chief Justice.

In 1903 Booth as invited to clean the carpet in Westminster Abbey in preparation for the coronation of Edward VII and Queen Alexandra. The Royal Household were impressed. On 20th Oct 1902 the Lord Chamberlain wrote to Booth:

"Dear Sir,

I have submitted the subject of the Vacuum Cleaning Company's operations to The King, and I have His Majesty's permission to ask you to give a demonstration of its actual working at Buckingham Palace on Thursday next the 23rd inst at 12 o'clock, when I hope His Majesty will have an opportunity of witnessing it."

The demonstration was successful and as a result vast vacuum-cleaning units were installed in both Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle and the British Vacuum Cleaner Company earned the Royal Warrant of Appointment to His Majesty.

Booth's next successful demonstration of the mobile cleaner was held at the Royal Mint. On the way back to headquarters a Police van stopped them and insisted on escorting them back to the mint. They had inadvertently sucked a fair amount of gold dust into their dustbag.

In 1903 Booth was granted world patent rights for the vacuum cleaner. This started a long round of legal battles as would-be competitors attempted to cash in on his invention, and other inventors staked their claims.

One such was John Thurman, who patented a similar vacuum cleaner in the USA on Oct. 3^rd 1899. An ad from the St. Louis Dispatch newspaper offers vacuuming services at $4 per visit. The St. Louis Post Dispatch newspaper wrote an article in July 1905 about a Thurman horse-drawn vacuum whose lid apparently flew off and all the collected dirt was dispersed into the air.

Booth won all his actions and was granted full costs and substantial damages.

In 1904 the company claimed to have produced the world's first portable vacuum cleaner. This machine required two people to operate it (if not to lift it!). One would pump the bellows, the other would operate the cleaning tool.

This delightful example is from the Science Museum in the Science & Society Picture Library Collectionwas and was donated to the National Science Museum by Goblin B.V.C..

At that time servants were often afraid of vacuum cleaners because they were new and seen as a potential threat to their jobs. The posters showed both nervous servants and servants who had accepted the vacuum cleaner and recognised them as helpful "friends".

Other advertising gimmicks included transparent hoses to show how much dirt was being sucked up.

Cleaning demonstrations were held at London society tea parties. A team of uniformed men would arrive and clean the carpets and curtains in front of their delighted audience.

Soon the Company had orders for fixed cleaning machines at The Houses of Parliament, the Savoy Hotel, the Empire, the Leicester Square, the Gaiety Theatre and many other important buildings in London and the provinces.

When the 'very first' electric vacuum was made is all a matter of opinion. Both Thurman and Booth electrified the gasoline-powered versions of their machines as a central vac using technology more like an air compressor, not a vacuum cleaner at all. Thurman never started his own vacuum cleaner company (unlike Booth, who founded the Goblin brand vacuum cleaner).

At this time almost all vacuum cleaners were built-in models, and they all used some sort of vacuum pump, like a diaphragm on a bicycle pump, but did not use a fan to move the airflow. Many inventors were working on portable models, but the first one that actually got the carpet clean was the Spangler in 1907.

James Murray Spangler was inspired to developed his portable, electric model to combat his severe dust allergy. The Spangler introduced a brush to aid the cleaning of the carpet and a true suction fan. But even Spangler didn't make his fortune because he sold the idea to William Henry Hoover in 1908. Hoover was a clever businessman and the first manufacturer to successfully mass-produce vacuum cleaners.

The health benefits of the vacuum cleaner were becoming ever more apparent. The British Vacuum Cleaner Company commissioned Professor Stanley Kent of the Clinical and Bacteriological Research Laboratory of Bristol University to analyse a dust sample from Marlborough House on behalf of the H.R.H. the Princess of Wales. The results were overwhelming. He reported some 355,500,000 living organisms, including Diphtheria, in just one gramme of house dust. A similar test was carried out on dust from the House of Commons.

This evidence led to recognition of the company by the Royal Sanitary Institute and they were awarded the Rogers Field Gold Medal.

When a serious outbreak of Spotted Fever broke out among soldiers stationed at Crystal Palace, all conventional attemps to control the epidemic failed. Booth was called in, and 23 tons of dust were removed and buried. The health of the men improved immediately.

The company's first upright bag model was produced in 1921. The first cylindrical model, the Turbinet, appeared a few years later. At last vacuum cleaners were light and manageable enough for a housewife to carry upstairs.

In 1926 it was decided to put the whole range of vacuum cleaners under the trade name of 'Goblin'. Legend has it that Booth chose the name following the comment of the wife of one of the company's managing directors who said that the cleaner "was goblin' up the dirt".

The illustration right shows the Y12 Matchbox model of a G.M.C. Goblin Electric Cleaners van, dated 1937.

By 1939 the domestic market for vacuum cleaners had grown to around 400,000 a year, and hire purchase was contributing to further growth. Goblin established sales and service branches all over Britain.

In later years Booth wrote an autobiographical book: "The Origin of the Vacuum Cleaner". He died in 1955.

The direct descendent of Booth's British Vacuum Cleaner Company is Barloworld Vacuum Technology, incorporating BVC and Lamson. Now specialising in quality industrial vacuum cleaners, centralised vacuum cleaning systems and exhauster/blowers, BVC-bivac is renowned for quality, reliability and flexibility of design. However, the Goblin and Teasmade brand names dispersed in other directions.