Hoover became so synonymous with vacuuming that it became a British verb.
In 1907 an asthmatic Ohio janitor, James Murray Spangler, rigged up the first practical upright vacuum and sold the patent to a leather-goods maker named William Hoover. The company lost the market a century later — but across Britain people still “hoover” the stairs, usually with a Dyson.
Hoover on Brandseum