What type of security device was inventor Ken B. Smith developing in 1971?

Answer

A U-bar lock design

Around 1971, Ken B. Smith was independently working on a U-bar lock design, which coincided with the efforts of the students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This simultaneous development illustrates a period where rising urban theft rates were creating shared environmental pressures, leading different innovators to independently arrive at the same solution of using a robust, non-cuttable loop to secure bicycles.

What type of security device was inventor Ken B. Smith developing in 1971?
inventorsecuritymechanismbikelock