Orville Wright. Inventor. The younger of the two brothers who would invent the airplane and start the aerial age, he outlived his brother Wilbur by 36 years. After the successful four flights at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, they returned to Dayton and continued their experiments at Huffman Prairie. They were awarded a patent in 1906 and started trying to attract potential customers with demonstration flights in Europe and elsewhere. With orders in hand including a contract to build planes for the United States Army, Wilbur and Orville started the Wright Company and began filling orders, but upon the early death of Wilbur, Orville, discouraged, sold the business in 1912 and retired. The two had been very close, lived at home and never married.

Thomas Alva Edison Inventor. He was born in Milan, Ohio. His total formal school education was three months. His mother, a former school teacher, undertook his education. At the age of twelve, because he exhibited adult maturity, he convinced his parents to allow him to leave home and work as a newsboy aboard a train to Detroit. He published a weekly paper and sold it to passengers. Learning to operate a telegraph he gained employment. After a few years as a wandering operator, Edison settled in New York. Always, during employment, in his spare time, he worked on his inventions and experiments. Thomas Edison received $40,000 on ideas for improving the telegraph and telephone. He ventured out on his own, building a large work shop at West Orange, New Jersey. Here the invention of the phonograph was achieved. The electric light followed. Edison made over a thousand inventions from this laboratory. Some others were the moving-picture machine, the storage battery, the mimeograph, machines to help the iron and steel business. His inventions made possible our electric trains and streetcars. During the First World War, Edison was seventy. The government asked him to serve. He built a factory in eighteen days. Here he made many things which helped the army and navy. In his 80’s, his health began to fail. He obtained his last (1,093rd) patent at age 83. In August 1931, Thomas Edison collapsed at Glenmont (His residence located on a 15 acre estate). From that point, he steadily declined in health and was housebound until 3:21AM on Oct 18th, when the inventor died. A death mask was made. His body was placed in the Laboratory building on Lakeside, Avenue in West Orange and thousands of mourners paraded past. The evening of the day he was buried, countless individuals, communities and corporations throughout the world dimmed their lights, or briefly shut down their power in tribute. With Mrs Herbert Hoover, Henry Ford, and Harvey Firestone in attendance, he was buried at Rosedale Cemetery, Orange, New Jersey, with Mina, his second wife buried beside him upon her death. In 1963, the remains of both were exhumed from Rosedale Cemetery and reinterred at Edison’s Glenmont estate. Edison’s New Jersey Research Laboratory and Glenmont are today preserved as part of the Edison National Historical site.

Willis Haviland Carrier. Businessman, Inventor. Born in Angola, New York, he was engineer, most noted for inventing modern air conditioning. Educated at Cornell University, he started working at the Buffalo Forge Company in 1901. In 1902, he designed the first system to control temperature and humidity. His “Rational Psychrometric Formulae” introduced in 1911, initiated scientific air-conditioning design for home and industrial use. In 1915, he co-founded the Carrier Engineering Company, which became the world’s largest manufacturer of air-conditioning equipment. Carrier was purchased by United Technologies Corporation in 1979. He died at age 73 in New York City and was posthumously inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1985. He also was named one of TIME magazine’s “100 Most Influential People of the 20th Century”, in 1998.

Christopher Latham Sholes. Sholes is credited as the U.S. inventor who developed the typewriter. The inscription on his tomb stone reads: “The Father of the Typewriter. Dedicated by The Young Men and Women of America In Grateful Memory of one who Materially aided in The World’s Progress.” He was granted a patent for the typewriter on June 23, 1868. Later improvements gained him two more patents, but due to difficulty in raising money for development, he sold his patent rights. In 1873, he sold the rights for $12,000 to the Remington Arms Company, a firm well equipped with machinery and skill to carry out the development work that resulted in the machine being marketed as the Remington Typewriter.The Sholes keyboard is called the QWERTY keyboard because of the ordering of the first six keys in the third row. This arrangement, the Sholes QWERTY keyboard is still used today.

Philo Taylor Farnsworth. Inventor. He is best remembered for his contributions to television, radar, and the nuclear industry. Born in Beaver, Utah, he became interested in science and technology at age 12, when his father moved the family to Rigby, Idaho, where the family worked a farm. Young Philo’s interest in electronics started with a long distance telephone call to a relative, and was further peaked by the discovery of a large box of technology magazines in the attic of the family’s new home. In 1922, at the age of 16, he developed the idea of the image dissector, which he would later state came to him in an inspiration while plowing a potato field, row by row. He realized that an electron beam could scan an image in much the same way, line by line, just as people read a book. He patented the idea of the Cathode Ray Tube just six years later. He was further inspired by his high school chemistry teacher, Justin Tolman, who gave him extra instruction. At age 16, he was accepted to Brigham Young University, but was forced to leave after his sophomore year, when his father died suddenly. After a brief stint in the US Navy, Philo returned to Idaho to support his mother. In 1926, he formed a partnership with George Everson, moving to San Francisco to set up a lab, where he worked on his television. On September 7, 1927, he demonstrated the principle of television by sending an image from one room to another, proving that television was possible. By 1936, Farnsworth’s company was transmitting regular entertainment programs, and shortly after, he signed a deal to form standard television programs for Great Britain. After inventing a camera tube he called the Iconoscope and setting up his own television manufacturing company, Farnsworth was sued by the RCA Corporation over royalties, contending that RCA inventor Vladimir Zworykin had invented the tube in 1926. Farnsworth’s high school teacher, Justin Tolman, proved the case by showing the court a drawing Philo had made at age 16 while in high school; the drawing was an almost exact replica of the Image Dissector. RCA paid Farnsworth royalties for only two years. During World War II, the US Government suspended sales of television sets, and Philo’s patents expired at the end of the war. After the war, RCA quickly took over the television market, without having to pay Philo any additional royalties. In 1947, he suffered a nervous breakdown, made worse by excessive drinking. Philo Farnsworth went on to invent over 165 different devices including equipment for converting an optical image into an electrical signal, amplifier, cathode-ray, vacuum tubes, electrical scanners, electron multipliers and photoelectric materials. Following the war, Philo worked on a fusor, an apparatus designed to create nuclear fusion, which he hoped would make electricity virtually cost free. When introduced into the nuclear research world in the late 1960s, many hoped the fusor would lead to a practical neutron source, and it has been commercially produced for this role. He died in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1971. Farnsworth has been honored several times: a plaque honoring him as “the Genius of Green Street” is at 202 Green Street, the site of his San Francisco laboratory, and a statue of Farnsworth represents the state of Utah in the hall of fame in the US Capitol building. In December 2005, the Boy Scouts of America posthumously honored him with his Eagle Scout Badge, which he had not received during his childhood, caused by the family move to Idaho.

Eli Whitney, II. Inventor of the cotton gin. The invention was able to clean a thousand pounds a day. It had taken a slave all day to clean one pound by hand. The device was not only an economic bonanza for the South but also the North which had the mills for making cotton into cloth. Whitney with a partner opened a factory in Hamden, Connecticut, an endeavor to manufacture the gin in an attempt to cash in on the device. The company was soon in jeopardy with production problems and then the building was destroyed including their stock of gins. However, within seven months they were again in business but more problems plagued the operation causing them to get out of the gin business and start making muskets for the U.S. government. Whitney had perfected a way to manufacture them by machine so that the parts were interchangeable. A deal was struck to supply the government with 10,000 musket kits. He not only became wealthy but the country’s foremost arms supplier. The growth of slavery increased. Cotton became so profitable it greatly increased the demand for slave labor. Today at Mulberry Grove, Port Wentworth, Ga., the foundation still stands on which the first cotton gin was erected. A State Historical Marker has been erected at the nearby city hall in Port Wentworth proudly proclaiming the area as the birthplace of the gin. However most of the legacy is located at Hamden, Connecticut. The New Haven Historical Society has preserved what is left of the Whitney factory complex which was located on the Mill River using it as the power for running machinery. Whitney constructed a low dam and waterwheels that made possible the Whitney Armory and its adjacent small settlement of Whitneyville where the employees lived.

Albert James Myer. Civil War Union Brevet Brigadier General. He attended Buffalo Medical College, graduated in 1851 and from 1854 to 1869, he served as Assistant Surgeon in the US Army. In 1858, while serving in the West, he was inspired by the signaling system of the Native Americans and developed the “wig-wag” military signaling system adopted for use by the government. At the advent of the Civil War as a Major, he became the army’s first signal officer, when he received orders from Washington to organize and command the Signal Corps in June 1861. He served as chief signal officer to General George B. McClellan, participating in all of the battles from Bull Run to Antietam. He then returned to Washington, where he took charge of the United States signal office on March 3, 1863, with the rank of Colonel. For his service and innovations to the Signal Corps, he was brevetted Brigadier General U.S. Army, on March 13, 1865. In July 1866, Congress reorganized him as the Signal Corps chief signal officer, a position he held until his death. Hobart College awarded him an honorary Ph.D. degree in 1872 and Union College conferred an honorary Ph.D. on him in 1875. Through the US Army Signal Corps and Meteorology he has also recognized as the “founder and father” of the US Weather Bureau and was U.S. Delegate to the International Conferences of Vienna, Austria, 1873 and Rome, Italy, 1879.

Dr Daniel Draper. Director of the Meteorological Observatory in Central Park, New York City 1869-1911; Inventor of Draper’s Self Recording Weather Instruments. husband of Nancy Maury Ludlow

John Deere. Inventor, Industrialist. He is best known for founding the yard, farm and earthmoving equipment company that bears his name. John Deere was born in Rutland, Vermont, on February 7, 1804, the third son of William Rinold Deere, a merchant tailor. In 1808, William sailed for England, in hopes of claiming an inheritance, but he was never heard from again, and is presumed lost at sea. Raised by his widowed mother on a meager income, John’s education was limited to the primary schools of Vermont. He apprenticed himself to a blacksmith, and entered the trade in 1825. On January 28, 1827, he married Demarius Lamb. By 1836 the couple had four children, Demarius was pregnant with the fifth, and John was faced with bankruptcy. Deere sold his blacksmith shop to his father-in-law, left the proceeds of the sale with Demarius, and headed for Illinois frontier. He continued on to the newly settled village of Grand Detour, Illinois, on the edge of the frontier. There were no blacksmiths for forty miles, so Deere had work at once. On the Illinois frontier, the sticky, heavy prairie soil was proving difficult to work. Cast iron plows which worked fine in the light, sandy soils of the Northeast were ineffective. Plowing to break up the tough prairie sod was slow, hard work requiring the constant use of paddles to scrape the sticky soil off. Farmers came to Deere hoping that he could help them. John Deere was convinced that a steel plow that was highly polished and had a properly shaped moldboard could scour itself as it cut furrows. The first steel plow, made from a broken steel saw blade, was originated by John Lane of Joliet Illinois in 1833. In 1837, Deere added further improvements to Lane’s idea when he fashioned his first moldboard plow, also made from broken steel saw blade. It was an immediate success. Deere’s first plows used the saw blade steel for the share and smoothly ground wrought iron for the moldboard. Deere’s first plow, finished in 1837, worked better than any previous plow. In 1838 he built two more plows, one of which was sold to Joseph Brieton, who farmed just south of Grand Detour. That very implement was later discovered and purchased by Charles Deere and is on display at the Smithsonian Institution. By 1841, Deere was producing 100 of his plows annually. In 1843, he entered a partnership with Leonard Andrus to produce more plows to meet increasing demand. By 1848, Deere dissolved his partnership with Andrus and moved the business to Moline, which offered advantages of water power, coal and rail transportation. In 1850, approximately 1600 plows were made, and the John Deere Company was soon producing other tools to complement its steel plow. In 1858, Deere transferred leadership of the company to his son, Charles, who served as its vice president. John Deere retained the title of president of the company, but now turned his attention to civic and political activities. John Deere was active in public life throughout his career in Moline. Among other roles, he was the second president of the National Bank of Moline, served as a director of the Moline Free Public Library, was an active member of the First Congregational Church and served as the city’s mayor for two years. John Deere died on May 17, 1886, at his home in Moline. Today Deere and Co. is a leading maker of yard, farm and earthmoving equipment, with a market capitalization of nearly $17 billion on the New York Stock Exchange.

Howard Robard Hughes, Sr. Inventor. The father of Howard Hughes Jr., he invented the 64 tooth drill bit used to cut through hard rock while drilling for oil, it is still used today. The wealth he accumulated went to his son.

John Colgan. Inventor. Druggist at Tenth and Walnut Streets, was the first to manufacture chewing gum by adding chicle, a new chewing substance, to the extract of balsam tolu, which he used in making cough syrup. With his son, William, marketing Colgan’s Taffy Tolu, the Cogan Chewing Gum Company prospered and sold out in 1911.

Dr Charles Courtice Alderton. Inventor. He was the creator of the “Dr. Pepper” soft drink. Born in Brooklyn, New York to British immigrants, he went to England after his early education, where he attended a college in Stowmarket. He returned to Brooklyn during the Westward Expansion, and attended medical school at the University of Texas in Galveston, Texas. Graduating with an M.D., he decided to work as a pharmacist, moving to Waco, Texas to join W. B. Morrison in his Old Corner Drug Store. He soon noticed that patrons of the soda fountain soon were tired of the standard fountain flavors. He confirmed this by his own taste experiments which led him to concoct a series of mixtures to find a more original drink. After exhaustive testing of combinations of fruit extracts from the fountain, he finally discovered one that was particularly pleasing. Carefully measuring the different syrups and fine tuning the product as he went, he invited Morrison to try his new drink, which Morrison loved. When the product as offered to their fountain patrons as a test, the reaction was overwhelming. Charles Alderton’s drink caught on fast and soon customers were asking for “Doc Alderton’s drink.” Morrison came up with the name for it, naming it “Dr. Pepper”, after the father of a girl he had once courted. After 100 years the soda is still much the same product Charles Alderton created, and is one of the most popular sodas today.

Carl Edward Sagan. Scientist. He was an American astronomer and science writer who used his talents not only for scientific research and government space projects but also in mass media. He obtained his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1960 and taught at the University of California, Berkeley and Harvard university and also worked at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (1962 to 1968). He is perhaps best known for his work (as co-producer and narrator) in his television series “Cosmos” (1980). Major publications included “Atmospheres of Mars and Venus” (1961); “Planetary Exploration” (1970); “The Cosmic Connection: An Extraterrestrial Perspective” (1973); “Broca’s Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science” (1979); the novel “Contact” (1985); “Nuclear Winter” (1985); and “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark” (1996).

John Glenn. Astronaut, US Senator. Born John Herschel Glenn, Jr., he was the first American to orbit the Earth and went on to serve in the United States Senate from 1975 to 1999. He was a veteran of both World War II and the Korean War, serving as a fighter pilot in both the Navy and Marine Corps. After the Korean War ended, he became a test pilot and when the newly formed NASA began recruiting astronauts in 1958, he applied and was selected as one of the original Mercury Seven. On February 20, 1962, he became the third American in space and the first to orbit the earth when he lifted off in Friendship 7. His observations of the the journey fascinated watchers at home, particularly his description of “little specks, brilliant specks, floating around outside the capsule”. He came back to Earth after five hours and was honored as a national hero, met President Kennedy at the White House, and was given a ticker-tape parade in New York City. He left NASA in 1964 and retired from the Marines a year later. He first entered the world of politics by running for the US Senate from Ohio in 1964, but had to withdraw from the race early due to a concussion sustained during a fall. He ran again ten years later in 1974 for the Senate and defeated Republican Ralph Perk to become a United States Senator. He served in the Senate for four terms until retiring in 1999. During his tenure in the Senate, he was the chief author of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978 and also sought the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984. Before retiring from the Senate, he went up in space for a second time, this time on the Space Shuttle Discovery, in 1998. In his later years he founded the John Glenn Institute of Public Service and Public Policy at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio. He also taught at the school as an adjunct professor. Among his many honors were the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, and six Distinguished Flying Crosses. 

Christa Corrigan McAuliffe. Astronaut, Educator. She was a teacher, and was slated to be the first civilian in space, assigned to fly about the ill-fated space shuttle “USS Challenger”. The image of her jaunty stride and exuberant wave as she entered Challenger spacecraft shortly before the ill-fated mission ended in tragedy has become an icon of the 20th century. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan, in an attempt to rekindle the excitement of the early days of America’s space adventures, directed that the first ordinary Unites States citizen in space would be “one of America’s finest, a teacher.” The energetic Social Studies teacher from Concord High School, Concord, New Hampshire, noted on her eleven-page application, “I watched the Space Age being born and I would like to participate.” In July 1985, Christa was selected over 11,500 other applicants to become the first Teacher In Space. As a payload specialist on the Challenger mission, she trained side by side with the other six Challenger astronauts. She prepared materials for the two lessons scheduled during the flight and planned to keep a journal, reminiscent of the journals kept by pioneer women crossing the 1800s frontier. Instead, millions of school children and adults watched horrified as the Challenger exploded only 73 seconds after lift-off. Christa’s influence continues to touch the lives of school children and adults alike. The Christa McAuliffe Planetarium, opened in 1990 in Concord, New Hampshire, carries on her vision of educating students of all ages about astronomy and space science: “I touch the future, I teach.”

Jack Swigert, Jr. Astronaut, US Congressman. Born John Leonard Swigert in Denver, Colorado, he served with the US Air Force as a fighter pilot 1953 to 1956 and with the Air National Guard 1957 to 1965. He held a position as engineering test pilot for North American Aviation, Inc. before joining NASA as an Astronaut in April 1966. He served as a member of the astronaut support crew for the Apollo 7 mission and was assigned command module pilot as a late replacement ten days before the Apollo 13 moon mission on April 11, 1970. Approximately 55 hours into the mission the flight plan was modified en-route to the moon due to a failure of the Apollo 13 service module cryogenic oxygen system. Together with fellow crewmen, James A. Lovell and Fred W. Haise, they worked closely with Houston ground controllers, converted their lunar module “Aquarius” into a effective lifeboat. Thus a possible space disaster resulted into a successful failure which safely returned the crew to earth. Swigert took a leave of absence from NASA to become Executive Director of the Committee on Science and Technology in 1973. He resigned from NASA and the committee in August 1977. In November 1982, he was elected as a Republican to the US Congress but died of cancer before he could take his oath of office.

Henry Augustus Ward. Scientist. Born in Rochester, New York, he studied at the Middlebury Academy, and continued on to the Paris School of Mines. He collected countless geological specimens from Europe and Africa, specializing in an impressive collection of meteorites. He returned to Rochester in 1860, teaching at the University of Rochester, where he founded Ward’s Natural Science Establishment, the internationally known supplier of scientific educational materials. His memorial was designed by renowned architect and spiritualist Claude Bragdon and is topped by a huge jasper-flecked boulder which Ward discovered in Georgian Bay, Canada. He was struck and killed by an automobile while walking across a street. His death was one of the first deaths by automobile. 

Dr Lewis Howard Latimer. Engineer, Inventor. Highly accomplished African-American pioneering engineer in the field of electricity. Dr. Lewis Howard Latimer worked closely with inventors Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison to help bring about the 20th century’s technological revolution. Born in 1848 in Chelsea, Massachusetts near Boston, Latimer was the son of fugitive slaves George and Rebecca Latimer. Latimer would later fight for freedom during the Civil War, concealing the fact that he was under age so he could serve on a Union gunboat. Afterward he returned to Boston and found work as an office boy for a firm of patent lawyers. From these humble beginnings, Latimer worked his way up and became a master draftsmen, engineer, and inventor. He married Mary Wilson who preceded him in death on September 20, 1873 and the couple had one daughter. Latimer’s first major contribution to science took place when he drew the patent plans for the telephone, making the production of Bell’s invention possible. Next, he revolutionized incandescent lighting-by discovering a way to make the filaments in Edison’s light bulb more durable-and supervised the installation of electric street lighting in New York City, Philadelphia, Montreal, and London. His keen understanding of the electric light and power industries eventually earned him an important position on Edison’s staff. Because achievements by African-Americans were seldom publicized in his day, Latimer never saw his name earn it’s proper place in history. Yet he refused to let “unnumbered wrongs” break his spirit. Ever determined to make something of his life, Latimer was, as he himself said, “unconquered and unconquerable.” Dr. Lewis Latimer died on December 11, 1928. Since his death his home in Flushing, New York, has been moved to a new location in Queens to serve as a museum.

John Roffo Oishei. Co-founder (with Dr. Peter C. Cornell & William P. Haines) of a corporation manufacturing windshield wipers (a “Rain Rubber”) using the invention of John W. Jepson. The corporate name became “Tri-Continental Corp” and ultimately became “Trico”.

Sylvan Nathan Goldman. His greatest contribution was the shopping cart, invented in 1936 and patented by Goldman. He established the Folding Basket Carrier Company to manufacture his invention. It was just the beginning of a list of creations that revolutionized the grocery industry: the grocery sacker, the folding interoffice basket carrier, and the handy milk bottle rack.

Worcester Reed Warner. Scientist. Manufacturer of Optical Instruments and Philanthropist. Close friend of next door neighbor John D. Rockefeller. In 1929 gave $300,000 to build the Warner Library in Tarrytown. Founded Warner & Swasey a machine tool and precision instrument company in Cleveland which also made astronomical telescopes for the government. He was president of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and a Fellow of the Royal Astronomers’ Society of Great Britain. The ASME annually awards the Worcester Reed Warner Medal, a gold medal, for outstanding contribution to the permanent literature of engineering.

Robert Fulton. Inventor, Artist. While not the inventor of the steamboat, he was very instrumental in constructing a steamboat named the “Clermont”,and parlaying it into a commercial success with the first permanent commercial route in history on the Hudson River. Chancellor Robert R. Livingston backed the venture with his financial and political influence. He was born near the town, on a farm, today known as Quarryville, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The site today is a National Historic Landmark, while the stone house where Fulton was born, was destroyed by fire, has since been restored to its original appearance. It is operated by the Southern Lancaster Historical Society and houses many items from the inventors life. He was born to Robert, a farmer, and Mary Fulton into a family that would ultimately number five. Robert senior would soon die leaving his widow scantily provided with the small children. However, Mary Fulton prevailed, home schooling the family with Robert at age eight, enrolled in a local Quaker school. Fulton was an average student but excelled at drawing, painting and mechanics while growing up. Upon completing an apprenticeship to a Philadelphia jeweler while supporting himself as a painter of portraits and landscapes, he moved to England to study painting under Benjamin West but grew more interested in engineering and naval warfare. While living in France, Fulton built the submarine Nautilus, an experimental steam powered vessel. During his lifetime, he was involved in a wide variety of projects, including inventing various tools and working with the U.S. Navy on the development of the torpedo, actually blowing up a brig in New York Harbor as a demonstration. He also designed the world’s first steam-powered warship which was launched after his death. Finally, in partnership with Robert Livingston, he designed and constructed a steamboat, his ultimate venture, named “The North River Steamboat, later called the “Clermont.” The craft left New York City, proceeding up the Hudson River to Albany in only 32 hours At age 49, at the height of his fame and while working on various projects, a serous cold developed into pneumonia bringing about his death at his residence located in what is now Battery Place in lower Manhattan. His body lay in state there until a procession was formed conveying him to historic Trinity Church the site of his funeral. Thousands lined the route as minute-guns were fired from a steam-frigate anchored off shore in the Hudson River and the New York Battery. His service was attended by representatives from both the National and State governments as well as high officials of the City of New York. Interment followed with placement beside his wife (nee Harriet Livingston) in her family vault at Trinity Church Yard Cemetery. Aftermath and Legacy…The vault became weather beaten and Robert Fulton’s name was never added to the list of the persons occupying the chamber and his resting place became hardly known. On the top of the vault was a brownstone slab, the inscriptions were virtually obliterated. In 1901, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers sought to rectify this by placement of a cenotaph marker, a short distance from the burial vault, which is a column bearing on one side a bronze medallion portrait. However, the gesture did little to pin point his burial place as the marker only confuses visitors who assume this is the grave of the famous, talented, inventor and genius. Fulton has the monopoly in county names honoring him across America…location of some are in the States of Georgia, Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania (Curiously, the Pennsylvania county of his birth honors another) and New York. A life size marble statue of Fulton created by Howard Roberts Palmer is located in Statuary Hall, United States Capitol. His honors in New York City are unique. Along his namesakes, Fulton Street, and located here is Fulton Park, nearly two thousand acres in size. 

Benjamin Banneker. Inventor, Scientist. He is arguably the best-known African-American figure in early United States history. Born near Baltimore, Maryland in 1731, his grandmother, an Englishwoman, taught him to read and write. It was while attending school that he developed an interest in mathematics and science. Later, while a farmer, Banneker pursued his mathematical studies and taught himself astronomy. Fascinated with time pieces, in 1753 at age 22, he carved a clock entirely out of wood by hand, with his only models being a pocket watch and an old picture of a clock (the clock he made kept almost perfect time for over 50 years). Going on to become a respected mathematician, he published the first “Maryland Almanac” for several years, in which he calculated all the scientific computations himself. In 1791, he was appointed an assistant to Major Andrew Ellicott by President George Washington to be on the surveying team that determined the boundaries for America’s capital, Washington, D.C., having been recommended by Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson.

Emile Berliner. Inventor. Born in Hanover, Germany, he is best known for developing the disc record. In the 1870s, he relocated to Washington D.C. and in November 1887, he patented the first successful system for sound recording that could be mass-produced. He also invented the microphone device used as a telephone speech transmitter. Berliner’s trademark, a picture of his dog Nipper listening to his master’s voice being played from a gramophone was used by RCA Victor.

Smiley Jordan Blanton. Psychiatrist, Author. He gained wide acclaim with his work with Rev. Norman Vincent Peale and authoring several psychiatric books. A Freud-trained psychiatrist, Dr. Blanton teamed with Peale to begin a religious-psychiatric clinic during the Great Depression in the Marble Collegiate Church in New York City. They were trying to respond to the deep-rooted psychiatry needs of the church’s congregation. In 1951, this clinic was organized into the American Foundation of Religion and Psychiatry, with Peale being president and Blanton as executive director. This clinic also trained clergy to be able to respond to their congregation’s psychiatric needs. Blanton and Peale co-wrote several books, with most notably being their first, “Faith Is the Answer: A Pastor and Psychiatrist Discuss Your Problems.” Today, the clinic is still open as Blanton and Peale Institute and Counseling Center, with advertisements reading, “providing affordable holistic mental health care in Midtown Manhattan” in New York City. As a strict Presbyterian from a Southern family, Blanton earned his M.D. from Cornell University in 1914. He had psychiatric training under Dr. Adolf Meyer, chief of psychiatric medicine at John Hopkins Hospital. After serving in the United States military during World War I, he studied from 1922 to 1923 neurology and psychiatric medicine receiving a degree from the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons in London, England. He then taught at the University of Minneapolis,established the first child guidance clinic in public health medicine, in 1927 started a nursery school at Vassar College in New York, and then began his private practice of psychoanalysis in New York City. Through colleagues encouragement, he sought Sigmund Freud for an analysis. Dr. Blanton was a patient of Freud from September 1, 1929 to May 30, 1930. He had several more weeks of analysis with Freud in August 1935, August 1937 and in London in August 1938. When Blanton met Freud in 1935 in Vienna, Austria, he was encountering Nazi army persecution of the Jews. Blanton urged Freud to leave the country before he was sent to a concentration camp and killed. Freud agree that his life was in danger, and inscribed a copy of “The Interpretation of Dreams” as a gift to Blanton. This may be the reason there was not a 1936 session as Freud was escaping to England. Blanton was allowed to take notes of his analytic sessions. These notes were used for his 1971 book, “Diary of My Analysis with Freud.” The analysis was conducted in English and Freud’s English was described as being perfect. Having an interest in children, he wrote his 1919 “Speech Training for Children: The Hygiene of Speech.”