On this day in Cleveland, Ohio in 1914 the world's first electric traffic light was put into place. It resided on the corner of Euclid Avenue and East 105th Street.
In the beginning days of the automobile, driving America's roads was chaotic and somewhat dangerous. There were pedestrians, horses, streetcars, and bicycles all competing for the same roads. Once horse drawn carriages started disappearing from the roads it alleviated the issues a bit, but it was clear there needed to be a system. The streets needed some sort of system to reduce the number of collisions on the road.
There are several who claim to be the first person responsible for the world's first traffic signal. In 1868 a traffic device was installed in London that had two arms that would extend horizontally to signal people to stop, and a 45 degree angle that signaled caution or slow down.
In 1912, a Salt Lake City police officer named Lester Wire created his own traffic signal. He mounted a wooden box with colored red and green lights to a pole. The wires attached to overhead trolley and light wires and would signal people to go or stop.
But out of them all, the inventor Garrett Morgan has been given the credit for invented the T-shaped traffic signal, patented in 1923. It was later reportedly sold to General Electric.
Despite Morgan’s greater visibility, the traffic signal installed in Cleveland on August 5, 1914 designed by James Hoge, is regarded as the first electric traffic signal. In 1918, James received U.S. patent 1,251,666 for his “Municipal Traffic Control System." It was made up of four pairs of red and green lights. These served as stop-go indicators. Each of the lights were mounted on a corner post and wired to a manually operated switch inside a control booth. It was designed in such a way that conflicting signals were impossible. A 1914 article in The Motorist stated, “This system is, perhaps, destined to revolutionize the handling of traffic in congested city streets and should be seriously considered by traffic committees for general adoption.”
