One of the earliest systematic approaches to examining the sources of industrial

innovation was published as a book by Jewkes, Sawers, and Stillerman in 1958. The book’s title was The Sources of Invention. In it, the authors looked at some sixty of the most significant technological innovations of the first half of the twentieth century.

They created a brief case study for each innovation. Then they reviewed all sixty innovations with a view to identifying patterns. In 1958, the lead author – John Jewkes – published a short article summarizing the findings of the study. This article appeared in the January issue of Lloyds Bank Review.