Charles Brown

Charles Brown was a German-born machinist who, according to his own accounting, worked at the problem of perpetual motion beginning in 1862, ultimately devising what he called Brown's Eureka Self-Motor, a type of gravity motor, and established the Eureka Self-Motor Company at Boston, Massachusetts in 1884 to promote it. It is unclear how long this concern lasted, but Brown himself seems to have departed Boston not long thereafter, and nothing more has been found regarding the business nor the invention.

Press Coverage

• Rochester Democrat (20 Apr. 1882), "Still Seeking an Impossibility.", Osage Free City Press (Osage City, KS): 3, https://www.newspapers.com/clip/117861252/still-seeking-an-impossibility/ 
  

  One of the most persistent of these pursuers of the delusion has recently come to light, and is one Charles Brown, of Corry, Pennsylvania. He is a German, and first conceived the idea of perpetual motion while working as a machinist in Karlsruhe, Baden, in 1862. Since that date he hsa worked at his idea almost constantly, and is now working upon a machine which he says will weigh about thirty-five pounds — and is sure, in his judgment, to succeed. He has built and abandoned several machines as failures in his labor of twenty years. This last construction he expects to complete soon.

• DFP (2 July 1883), "Only a Bolt Lacking.", Detroit Free Press (Detroit, MI): 4, https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/117678888/ 
  

  Charles Brown, of Corry, Pa., now located in Boston, has a similar machine on the stocks, and singularly enough, not a few good machinists of that city are of the opinon that he is on the right track. He says it is completed and he is only waiting for his foreign patents before exhibiting it to the incredulous public.

• PWU (6 July 1883), "Notes.", Perryville Weekly Union (Perryville, MO): 2, https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/687695319/ 
  

  Charles Brown, a citizen of Boston, Mass., now claims to have discovered perpetual motion, and promises, in a short time, a public demonstration of his claims. For many long years have various individuals taxed their brains to discover something of the kind, but it always ended in a failure, and we predict that such will be the case with Mr. Brown before he is many months older.

• BG (30 Jan. 1884), "IT WILL RUN FOREVER, Or, at Least, Until Friction Wears It Out. This is Mr. Brown's Idea in Regard to His Invention. Another Who Thinks He Has Discovered Perpetual Motion.", Boston Globe (Boston, MA): 2, https://www.newspapers.com/clip/117860188/it-will-run-forever-or-at-least/