He is credited for inventing the stromuhr.

Last year's winner, Anamika Veeramani from Cleveland, Ohio, won by spelling "stromuhr" correctly.

A stromuhr (literally: German for stream clock) was a medical instrument designed by Carl Ludwig in 1867 to measure the strength of flow in major arteries and veins.

Anamika Veeramani, from North Royalton, Ohio (a suburb of Cleveland), a student at Incarnate Word Academy in Parma Heights, won the Bee with the word Stromuhr.

Palmer manufactured instruments like the kymograph, invented by the German physiologist Carl Ludwig in 1847, the Stromuhr (another design by Ludwig) for measuring the rate of bloodflow and a 'dotting machine', designed by William McDougall to measure and record levels of fatigue.