Frank Joseph Zamboni Jr. (/zæmˈboʊni/, Italian:[dzamˈboːni]; January 16, 1901 – July 27, 1988) was an American businessman and inventor whose most famous invention is the modern ice resurfacer, with his surname being registered as a trademark for these devices.[1][2][3]
Biography
Zamboni was born in 1901 in Eureka, Utah, to Italian immigrants. His parents soon bought a farm in Lava Hot Springs, Idaho near Pocatello, Idaho, where he grew up. In 1920, he moved with his parents to the harbor district of Los Angeles, where his older brother George was operating an auto repair shop. After Frank attended a trade school in Chicago, he and his younger brother Lawrence opened an electrical supply business in 1922 in the Los Angeles suburb of Hynes (now part of Paramount). The following year he married and eventually had three children, a son and two daughters.[4] In 1927, he and Lawrence added an ice-making plant and entered the block ice business. They continued their ice business in 1939, but saw little future in that business with the advent of electrically operated refrigeration units. They decided to use their excess refrigeration equipment to open an ice rink nearby.
In 1940, the brothers, along with a cousin, Pete Zamboni, opened the Iceland rink, which proved very popular, in no small part because Frank had devised a way to eliminate rippling caused by the pipes that were laid down to keep the rink frozen. He obtained a patent for that innovation in 1946. Then, in 1949, he invented a machine that transformed the job of resurfacing an ice rink from a five-man, 90-minute task to a one-man, 15-minute job.[4] The initial machine included a hydraulic cylinder from an A-20 attack plane, a chassis from an oil derrick, a Jeep engine, a wooden bin to catch the shavings, and a series of pulleys.[5][6] His son, Richard, said, "It took him nine years. One of the reasons he stuck with it was that everyone told him he was crazy."[6] Zamboni did not expect to make more but, after seeing the machine, Sonja Henie immediately ordered two, and then the Chicago Blackhawks placed an order.[6][7] Zamboni applied for a patent in 1949 – obtained in 1953 – and set up Frank J. Zamboni & Co. in Paramount to build and sell the machines.
The machine shaves ice off the surface, collects the shavings, washes the ice, and spreads a thin coat of fresh water onto the surface.[5] In the early 1950s, Zamboni built them on top of Jeep CJ-3Bs, then on stripped Jeep chassis from 1956 through 1964.[8] Demand for the machine proved great enough that his company added a second plant in Brantford, Ontario and a branch office in Switzerland. Though the term Zamboni was (and remains) trademarked by his company, the name is sometimes generically used for any brand of ice resurfacing machine.
Zamboni's famous invention was the ice resurfacer; he created it in 1949.
In the 1970s, he invented machines to remove water from outdoor artificial turf surfaces, remove paint stripes from the same surfaces, and roll up and lay down artificial turf in domed stadiums. His final invention, in 1983, was an automatic edger to remove ice buildup from the edges of rinks.
And yet, according to one recent report, Zamboni “didn’t even like to skate.[9]
He died of cardiac arrest at Long Beach Memorial Hospital in July 1988 at the age of 87,[4] about two months after his wife's death. He also had lung cancer.[10] The Zamboni company has sold more than 10,000 units of its signature machine, the Zamboni Ice Resurfacer, commonly known as a "Zamboni." The 10,000th machine was delivered to the Montreal Canadiens in April 2012 for use at the Bell Centre.[11] The company is still owned and operated by the Zamboni family, including Frank's son and grandson. His remains are buried at All Souls Cemetery in Long Beach.
Zamboni was inducted into the Ice Skating Institute's Hall of Fame in 1965, and he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Engineering from Clarkson University in 1988. Frank was posthumously inducted into the NEISMA Hall of Fame in 1988, the United States Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 2000, the World Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 2006, the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2007, the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame in 2009,[12] and into the United States Speed Skating Hall of Fame in 2013.[13]
The Frank J. Zamboni School, in Paramount, is named after him.[14]
Patents
Patent Case File No. 2,642,679
Early patents:
Country - U.S. #1,655,034 Title: Adjustable Reaction Resistance (Electrical) Date Issued: Jan 3, 1928
Country - U.S. #1,710,149 Title: Reactance Coil (Electrical) Date Issued: Mar 11, 1930
Country - U.S. #1,804,852 Title: Circuit Controlling Reactance Coil (Electrical) Date Issued: May 12, 1931
Country - U.S. #2,411,919 Title: Ice Rink Floor Date Issued: Dec 3, 1946
Country - U.S. #2,594,603 Title: Refrigerated Liquid Storage Tank Date Issued: Apr 29, 1952
Country - U.S. #2,738,170 Title: Refrigerated Milk Storage Tank and Pasteurizer Date Issued: Mar 13, 1956
Ice resurfacers:
Country - U.S. #2,642,679 Title: Ice Resurfacer Date Issued: Jun 23, 1953
Country - U.S. #2,763,939 Title: Ice Resurfacer Date Issued: Sep 25, 1953
Country - U.S. #3,044,193 Title: Ice Resurfacer Date Issued: Jul 17, 1962
Country - U.S. #3,622,205 Title: Down Pressure Date Issued: Nov 23, 1971
Ice resurfacer-related products:
Country - U.S. #4,372,617 Title: Ice Edger Date Issued: Feb 8, 1983
Machine for Astro-Turf:
Country - U.S. #3,736,619 Title: Turf Water Remover Date Issued: Jun 5, 1973
Country - U.S. #3,835,500 Title: Turf Water Remover Date Issued: Sep 17, 1974
Country - U.S. #4,069,540 Title: Turf Paint Remover Date Issued: Jan 24, 1978
Country - U.S. #4,084,763 Title: Turf Handling Machine Date Issued: Apr 18, 1978
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