Introduction

The National Inventors Hall of Fame was founded in 1973 in a partnership with the US Patent and Trademark Office. In its first 50 years, 53 women were inducted. Each of these women had at least one US patent to their name and invented something of great impact. These women are a diverse group, but they are all firsts at something in their work, most were affected by gender bias at some point, and about three quarters spent at least some of their working life in businesses. The inventions of these women span 200 years, generally beginning with inventions focused on household work and then moving to electrical and chemical processes and more recently to biological inventions.