It comes in like a lion and often goes out the same way, but in between, March offers up such goodies as Read Across America Day, Daylight Saving Time, the Spring Equinox, St. Patrick’s Day, and, in 1987, got itself officially named Women’s History Month, 130 years after the birth of President and Chief Justice William Howard Taft.
Back in the 1800s, says AI, “The expected role for women was that of a homemaker, focusing on domestic tasks and raising children… some also found employment in service roles, factory work, teaching, and domestic service…”
Gotta love history and progress, too! For instance, not until Taft was born in 1857 did toilet paper come on the scene, and that was thanks to Joseph Gayetty. Called “Medicated Paper for the Water Closet,” it came 500 sheets to a package; in 1879, Scott Paper Company produced the first perforated toilet paper rolls…
But women made commercial progress, too, during Taft’s time, redefining themselves and improving life for everyone. Among them:
*** 1871/Paper Bag Machine: Columbia Paper Bag Company employee Margaret E. Knight figured that a flat-bottomed bag that could stand on its own could be filled more easily, so she made it happen, receiving a patent for her machine, one of 20 she ultimately received.
*** 1875/Special Globe Mounting: While serving as a governess in Canada, American Ellen Eliza Fitz designed a mount for a globe that allowed it to spin on its axis, revealing its yearly trip around the sun. Patented in 1875, it was first shown at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia the following year.
*** 1881/Locomotive Chimney: An early environmentalist, Mary Eilzabeth Walton received two patents, one for finding a way to deaden track noise—something Thomas Edison failed to do–and one that sent the smoke and soot from locomotives, industries, and home chimneys into water tanks to be later flushed into sewers, thus improving both noise and air pollution.
*** 1882/Life Raft: Called “the engineering dynamo of her time” by Iowa State University’s Institute of Transportation, Maria Beasley ultimately received 15 patents, two of them for her improved life-saving life raft design that just happened to save many on the RMS Titanic.
*** 1882/Alphabet Blocks: Poet, writer, and mother of four, Adelaine Dutton Train favored the traditional woman’s role as a homemaker of the times and patented a set of wooden alphabet blocks. Her model is still used today, usually made from maple ot beech wood, but plastic, too.
*** 1887/Fire Escape: It took Anna Connelly to design “a railed, fire-proof platform bridging neighboring buildings” that replaced death-defying ladders and robes of old and saved countless lives.
*** 1872/Dishwasher: Josephine Cochran designed a dishwasher that relied on water pressure instead of scrubbers, beating out competitors’ models and receiving a patent.
*** 1893/Car Heater: Mechanical engineer Margaret A. Wilcox somehow found a way to direct the hot air created by a car’s engine into the cab, receiving a patent for the first car heater.
*** 1898/Hairbrush: Hairdresser, inventor, and activist Lyda Newman was the first person to patent a hairbrush using synthetic bristles instead of animal hairs—and the first Black woman to garner a patent.
*** 1904/Monopoly: Typist Elizabeth “Lizzie” J. Magie came up with “The Landlord’s Game,” which, according to AI, was to show “how land-grabbing and the accumulation of wealth could lead to hardship and inequality.” It earned her a patent but didn’t gain popularity until the 1930s when Parker Brothers bought the rights and renamed it Monopoly.
*** 1908/Coffee Filter: German Melitta Benz decided to do something about the grounds in her coffee cup and mouth by punching some holes in the bottom of a brass pot and topping it with a sheet of blotting paper from her son’s notebook—the first coffee filter that earned her a patent that same year. German coffee and coffee filter company Melitta is named after her.
*** 1914/The Bra: In 1910, 19-year-old Caresse Crosby, aka Mary Phelps Jacob, put aside her tight-fitting, painful vest “stiffened with whalebones and steel rods” and made herself a light, more comfortable “undergarment” by sewing two silk handkerchiefs together with some pin ribbon and cord. Its popularity prompted her to patent her “Backless Brassiere,” selling them as “Caresse Crosby.”
Leave it to a woman…
~With thanks and good spring wishes, Carol
(Out of the Tub: President and Chief Justice William Howard Taft)
