Seven Great Women Inventors

We are bombarded by so much impressive new technology that it's easy to forget that many of the simple items we use everyday were once considered breakthroughs. It's probably not suprising that women had a hand in creating many of these ubiquitous items. Although the times in which these ideas were conceived prevented many of the inventors from reaping full benefits of their genius,the tools and products we rely on today may not have been possible without their pioneering work.

MARGARET KNIGHT
Margaret Knight, remembered as 'the female Edison -received some 26 patents for such diverse items as a window frame and sash, machinery for cutting shoe soles, and improvement to internal combustion engines. Her most significant patent was for machinery that would automatically fold and glue paper bags to create square bottoms, an invention which dramatically changed shopping habits.

SARAH BREEDLOVE WALKER
Sarah Walker, the daughter of former slaves, was orphaned at seven and widowed by 20. Madame Walker is credited with inventing hair lotions, creams, and improved hair styling hot comb. But her greatest achievement may be the development of the walker system, which included a broad offering of cosmetics, licensed walker agents and walker schools, which offered meaningful employment and personal growth to thousands of walker agents, Sarah walker was the first American woman self made millionaire.

MARY ANDERSON
During a trip to New York city Mary Anderson noticed that street car drivers had to open the windows of their cars when it rained in order to see, as a solution she invented as a swinging arm device with a rubber blade that was operated by the driver from within the vehicle via a lever. Her invention could clean snow, rain, or sleet from a windshield and it became standard equipment on all american cars by 1916. Mary Anderson patented the windshield wiper in 1905.

BETTE NESMITH

Bette Nesmith, an American typist and commercial artist, discovered something she couldn't live without: liquid paper. She used it secretly to correct mistakes she and co-workers made on the job, but eventually started her own company and began selling the products as 'liquid paper'. The company was sold to the Gillette corporation in 1979 for $47.5 million.

GERTRUDE B. ELION

Gertrude Elion, 1988 Nobel laureate in Medicine, and scientist emeritus with Burroughs Welcome company, is credited with the synthesis of two of the first successful drugs for leukemia, as well as imuron, an agent to prevent the rejection of kidney transplants, and zovirax, the first selective antiviral agent against herpes virus infections. Researchers who discovered AZT, a breakthrough treatment for AIDS , used Elion's protocols. Elion was included into the National Inventors Hall of fame in 1991, the first woman inductee.

STEPHANIE KWOLEK

Stephanie kwolek, one of dupont's leading chemists, discovered the 'miracle fiber' Kevlar, which has five times the strenght of steel by weight -uses for kevlar are seemingly endless, including ropes and cables for oil drilling rigs, boat sails, etc. Many Vietnam veterans and police officers are alive today because of protection provided by bullet-proof vests made from Kevlar. Kwolek was inducted into the National Inventors hall of fame in 1995.

JOSEPHINE COCHRAN

When Josephine Cochran ordered her servants aside and began washing her own dishes, she had a revelation : washing dishes was true drudgery. This realization is what led Cochran to invent the first practical dishwasher that used water pressure for cleaning. She succeeded in creating a working model, and patented it in 1886. The dishwasher included a larger model, and the model could clean 240 dishes in two minutes, as a result, it became popular with hotels and restaurants.