Book The Devil's Paintbrush by Dolf L. Goldsmith 2002 Deluxe Expanded Edition

The Devil's Paintbrush-
Sir Hiram Maxim's Gun
By Dolf L,. Goldsmith 2002 Deluxe Expanded Edition
584 pages, 819 illustrations

Dolf Goldsmith's celebrated study, which has been hailed as roaring back in a brand new expanded edition, containing 200 additional pages of text and nearly 300 brand- new illustrations. The story of the world's first automatic machine gun begins with Hiram's early life in pre-Civil War New England, and the remarkable rise of this largely self- educated man to a position of celebrated prominence where his crowning touch- the invention of the electric light- resulted in his being invited by a consortium of competitors to go to Europe for 10 years at a salary of $20,000 a year. To receive this salary, it was stipulated that "under no conditions was he to make any new electrical inventions". In Vienna, a fellow enforcedly idle Maxim "if you want to make a pile of money, invent something that will enable these Europeans to cut each others' throats with greater facility." Maxim did just that. In World War I the Maxim earned the dubious distinction of being used in virtually identical versions by both sides. Prototype and production versions of every sort of Maxim from over a dozen countries are described and illustrated, along with the varied and ingenious array of accessories and ancillaries produced around the world during the Maxim's 80 year lifespan.