Team Headworks wishes all of you and yours in this year 2007 good friends, good health, prosperity and the time to enjoy and reflect on it all!

This newsletter focuses on our curiosity as engineers and as people. In reviewing all of the things that happened over the years during January, the most intriguing event that put us to thinking was the patenting of the straw on January 2, 1888. How did that patent come about? What were the first straws like and when did people start using them? We dug up some history on this useful but little thought about tool for those of you who might be interested.

And that led us to wanting to share with all of you one of our favorite national public radio programs, "The Engines of Our Ingenuity," produced locally by the University of Houston's College of Engineering. The University presents this series about the machines that make our civilization run, and the people whose ingenuity created them. Click on the article to learn more about this fascinating series with over 2000 editions that answer some thought provoking questions and lead you to new ideas to consider.

Headworks is known for its tough ability to handle the largest, most challenging applications in the world. But even in small applications, challenges can occur, particularly when the users are prisoners with nothing better to do than figure out ways to interrupt the wastewater system! We highlight one of these applications in Texas in this newsletter and discuss some of the unusual solids that can end up at the screening system when prisoners get creative.

Wishing you a creative 2007,

Michele LaNoue and
The Headworks Team