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Automatic Door

An automatic door, also known as an auto door, is a door that opens automatically, usually on sensing the approach of a person.

In the 1st century AD, mathematician Heron of Alexandria in Roman Egypt invented the first known automatic door. He described two different automatic door applications. The first application used heat from a fire lit by the city's temple priest. After a few hours atmospheric pressure built up in a brass vessel causing it to pump water into adjacent containers. These containers acted as weights that – through a series of ropes and pulleys – would open the temple's doors at about the time people were to arrive for prayer. Heron used a similar application to open the gates to the city.[1]

In 1931, engineers Horace H. Raymond and Sheldon S. Roby of the tool and hardware manufacturer Stanley Works designed the first model of an optical device triggering the opening of an automatic door. The invention was patented and installed in Wilcox's Pier Restaurant in West Haven, Connecticut for the benefit of waiters carrying plates of food and drink. The entire system plus installation was sold for $100.[2][3]

In 1954, Dee Horton and Lew Hewitt invented the first sliding automatic door. The automatic door used a mat actuator. In 1960, they co-founded Horton Automatics Inc and placed the first commercial automatic sliding door on the market.[4]

Worksop (/ˈwɜːrksɒp/ WURK-sop) is the largest town in the Bassetlaw district of the ceremonial county of Nottinghamshire in the East Midlands of England. Worksop lies on the River Ryton, and is located at the northern edge of Sherwood Forest. Worksop is located 19 miles (31 km) east-south-east of Sheffield, with a population of 41,820.[2] It lies close to Nottinghamshire’s borders with South Yorkshire, and Derbyshire.

Worksop, a market town, has become a commuter town as a result of its geographic location and ease of access to major motorways and rail links.

Worksop is known as the "Gateway to The Dukeries", because of the now four obsolete ducal principal sites of which were closely located next to each other, south of the town. These four ducal locations were; Clumber House, Thoresby Hall, Welbeck Abbey and Worksop Manor. Other houses such as Rufford Abbey and Hodsock Priory are also just a few miles away.

Worksop is twinned with the German town Garbsen.

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