Štefan Banič, a Slovak laborer who emigrated to Pennsylvania, designs in 1913 an umbrella-type parachute fastened to the body after witnessing an aviation accident, and tests it in 1914 by jumping from a 15-story building and from an airplane before representatives of the Patent Office and the US Army in Washington D.C. Patent US no. 1,108,484 is granted on 3 June 1914. Banič donated the patent to the US Army without receiving financial compensation. Banič's parachute saved the lives of numerous American aviators during World War I. He returned to Czechoslovakia in 1920 without recognition and died in 1941 in anonymity. Slovakia dedicated a silver coin to him in 2020.