John Boyd Dunlop

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John Boyd Dunlop / Scientists and Inventors

'The name Dunlop became synonymous for tyres, but he never made any money from them'

Dunlop was born in Dreghorn, Ayrshire. He was a veterinary surgeon who in 1887 devised a rubber tyre for his son's tricycle. Unfortunately for his bank balance however, the rubber pneumatic tyre had been invented already, some 43 years' earlier in fact, by Robert Thomson. He sold his patent rights early on and did not capitalise on either his name or the tyre. Perhaps he had no wish to.

He died in Dublin at the good age of 81.

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