The Inventive Spirit of African Americans: Patented Ingenuity

Patricia Carter Sluby

Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004 - Social Science - 313 pages

In this important study, former United States primary patent examiner Patricia Carter Sluby pays homage to the inventive spirit of African Americans. Beginning with the contributions of enslaved Africans brought to American shores, Sluby introduces inventors and patent holders from all fields up to and including the leading edge of today's technology. Along with such recognizable figures as George Washington Carver and Madam C. J. Walker, readers will discover little-known or forgotten pioneers of devices such as a tobacco substitute, a home security system, and a portable heart monitor. Particular attention is given to the innovations of women inventors and scientists.

Products to ease domestic life, promote the efficiency of industrial processes, and improve the safety of leisure activities all bear the hallmarks of these creative minds. Sluby details the plight of inventive slaves during the antebellum and Civil War eras. She juxtaposes their efforts with those of free blacks of the same period. Reconstruction saw significant agricultural and industrial innovations by African Americans, some of which would permanently change American industry. Military inventions during the course and aftermath of both world wars showcase the diversity of minority ideas in an age of rapid technological advances. The closing chapter recounts the ongoing efforts of modern thinkers and their contributions in the high-tech and medical fields at the vanguard of the new century.

What people are saying

User Review -

You, like so many others, have forgotten one of the most important inventors in history. Bertha Berman invented the fitted sheet

User Review -

This BOOK is amazingly packed with information about inventors we knew and some we have never heard of. I would LOVE to share this book with many others about how these African-Americans became outstanding inventors! I also want to point out the wonderful mesaage this book tells us to never give up on a dream like becoming an inventor or what ever we dream of being. Children everywhere would LOVE this BOOK too! I JUST KNOW IT ; ) 

Contents

• ONCE UPON A tlME: 1
• EARLY CREATIVE MINDS: 9
• Dutifully Logged: 37
• Exposing Ebony Talent: 63
• ONWARD SOLDIERS OF FORTUNE: 93
• AMONG WOMEN AND FAMILY: 125
• The Leading Edge of Technology: 161
• CONCLUSION: 195
• MINORITIES IN THE PRACTICE OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAW: 199
• ROSIER OF AFRICAN AMERICAN PATENTEES Utility Grants from 1821: 203
• NOTES: 3
• BIBLIOGRAPHY: 11

Popular passages

Page xiii - Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things, that bringeth out their host by number; he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth.‎

About the author

PATRICIA CARTER SLUBY is a Registered Patent Agent and is a former United States primary patent examiner. She is also a lecturer and freelance writer who has appeared on television and radio shows to discuss minority inventors. She is the past president of the National Intellectual Property Law Association. Her book Creativity and Inventions: The Genius of Afro-Americans and Women in the United States and Their Patents (1987) details the inventive nature of minorities in America.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Inventive Spirit of African Americans: Patented Ingenuity
• Author: Patricia Carter Sluby
• Edition: illustrated
• Publisher: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004
• ISBN: 0275966747, 9780275966744
• Length: 313 pages
• Subjects: Social Science / Ethnic Studies / General; Technology & Engineering / Inventions