Very little is known about his early life beyond the fact that he was born in Virginia in By the s Brooks was living in Newark, New Jersey and working as a porter. His famous invention was actually an improved version of the existing street sweeper. The first street sweeper had been patented in , and the more recognizable model with brushes at the front was patented Patent , His version of the street sweeper improved the self-propelled front-brush sweeper.
The patent also detailed adjustments to the front brushes which made them of different lengths, and had a scraper for use with snow and ice. In , Brooks received financial backing from two investors, George M.
If you could imagine the days where a man would manually have to sweep the streets with a long horizontal head broom, shovel and dustpan, one would quickly surmise that this invention was not only a time saver but also extremely economical. Historically, prior to Brooks' truck, streets were commonly cleaned by walking workers, picking up by hand or broom, or by horse-drawn machines. Brooks' truck had brushes attached to the front fender that pushed trash to the curb.
There was less manual labor, less down time as we know what sweeping can do to one's back. Well, a man by the name It was a towed attachment with a built-in rotating brush wheel. Charles Brooks actually decided to improve on the sweeper design of C. Bishop, from Pennsylvania, who is credited with having invented the first street sweeper on September 4, Because Bishop's sweeper was a tow-behind machine, Brooks decided he could make the job a lot easier.
As far as Brooks was concerned, the regular way of cleaning the streets was too daunting and not very cost-effective. The Charles Brooks Papers consist of consists of 2 series. The first series, Cartoons contains original, dated cartoons from Brooks' tenure at the Birmingham News. Brooks often portrayed the Southern point of view on national issues however few of the cartoons in this particular collection focus on specific Birmingham or Alabama issues.
The Vietnam War and issues related to civil unrest dominated Brooks' subject matter during this time. The cartoons were drawn on illustration board primarily with ink and graphite. The second series is Correspondence and Newspaper Clippings which contains 8 pieces of correspondence sent to Brooks and 3 newspaper clippings , Cartoons are arranged in chronological order.
Correspondence and clippings are arranged as received. The majority of our archival and manuscript collections are housed offsite and require advanced notice for retrieval. Researchers are encouraged to contact us in advance concerning the collection material they wish to access for their research. Written permission must be obtained from SCRC and all relevant rights holders before publishing quotations, excerpts or images from any materials in this collection.
Special Collections Research Center has collections of over one hundred cartoonists.
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