Michael Invented Anti-Gravity Shoe; Leapt Past Thomas Edison

   The unending media coverage of the death of Michael Jackson only reinforced my sense that undeserving Hollywood celebrities have usurped the superstar status America once conferred on engineers, scientists and, especially, inventors. Until I stumbled upon U.S. Patent Number 5,255,452 granted to Michael J. Jackson and two other California inventors. When music critics described those Michael Jackson dance videos as "inventive," they had stumbled on a literal truth.

The abstract, on file at the U.S. Patent Office, describes:

Method and means for creating anti-gravity illusion 

A system for allowing a shoe wearer to lean forwardly beyond his center of gravity by virtue of wearing a specially designed pair of shoes which will engage with a hitch member movably projectable through a stage surface. The shoes have a specially designed heel slot which can be detachably engaged with the hitch member by simply sliding the shoe wearer's foot forward, thereby engaging with the hitch member.

---

Inventors:

Jackson; Michael J. (Los Angeles, CA), Bush; Michael L. (Hollywood, CA), Tompkins; Dennis (Hollywood, CA)

 

A link to the patent:

http://www.google.com/patents?id=MAUgAAAAEBAJ&printsec=abstract&zoom=4&source=gbs_overview_r&cad=0