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Henry Blair (inventor)
American inventor (1807 – 1860) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Henry Blair (c. 1807–1860) was the second African American inventor to receive a US patent (after Thomas L. Jennings).[1]
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Personal life
He was born in Glen Ross, Maryland, United States, in 1807.[citation needed] When he registered his first invention, Glenn-ross, Montgomery County, Maryland was given as his address.[2] Blair died in 1860.[3]
Inventions
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His first invention was a seed-planter,[4] patented October 14, 1834, which allowed farmers to plant more corn using less labor.
On August 31, 1836, he obtained a second patent for a cotton planter.[3] This worked by splitting the ground with two shovel-like blades which a horse pulled along. A wheel-driven cylinder followed, dropping the seed into the newly plowed ground.[1] Blair had been a successful farmer for years and developed the inventions to increase efficiency in farming.[5]
In the patent records, Blair is listed as a "colored man," making this identification the only one of its kind in early patent records. Blair signed his patents with an "x", suggesting he was illiterate.[6][better source needed] It is not known whether Blair was enslaved or free when he registered his patent.[3] When his patents were granted, United States patent law allowed freed and enslaved people to obtain patents.[3] In 1857, this law was challenged by an enslaver who claimed that he owned "all the fruits of the slave's labor," including their inventions.[3] This resulted in a change of the law in 1858, which stated that enslaved people were not citizens and could not hold patents.[3] In 1871, six years after the American Civil War ended, the law was changed to grant all men patent rights.[3]
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