A musical instrument called the ''glass armonica'' or ''glass harmonica,'' was invented in the 1760s in colonial America. Although the word 'harmonica' is in the name, it doesn't at all resemble the metal harmonicas with which you might be familiar....
but if we are defining the harmonica as a mouth-blown free reed instrument where the notes of the scale are selected by the player's mouth, rather than his or her fingers, then the usual answer to this question is that it was invented by sixteen year old Christian Buschmann in 1821. Bu...