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John Boyd Dunlop (1840 - 1921)

Born on a farm in North Ayrshire, Dunlop was a veterinary surgeon who settled in Belfast in 1867. In 1887 he developed the first practical pneumatic or inflatable tyre for his son’s tricycle, tested it, and patented it 1888. However, two years after he was granted the patent Dunlop was officially informed that it was invalid as Scottish inventor Robert Thomson (1822 - 1873), had already patented the idea in France and in the USA. Dunlop became one of the founders of the rubber company which bore his name and commercial production of his invention began in 1890 in Belfast.

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