Kentucky  - Our Place in the World    
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Sophia Kindrick Alcorn, (1883-1967), was born in Lincoln County, Kentucky and taught school at the Kentucky School for the Deaf in Danville, Kentuky where she developed a method for teaching deaf and blind children how to speak. This innovation, named the Tadoma teaching method is used around the world today. Thomas Harris Barlow, was born in Nicholas County, Kentucky, in 1789 and died in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1865. Among his innovations was a steamboat; a miniature and a large steam locomotive; a planetarium, a model of which was exhibited at the World's Fair in New York in 1851; an automatic nail and tack gun; and a rifled cannon. John Colgan, (1840-1916), was a pharmacist in Louisville, when he began selling chewing gum he developed from tree sap and powdered sugar. His gum, Taffy Tolu Chewing Gum sold so well, he gave up his drugstore and manufactured the product full time. Although some sources list Colgan as the "inventor of chewing gum", the product had been around for a great many years prior to his life. However, his methods of manufacturing did cause the gum to retain a better taste for longer periods of time. Elijah Craig, (1738-1808), a Baptist minister from Kentucky invented bourbon whiskey and built Kentucky's first paper mill. George Charles Devol Jr., the "Father of Robotics", was born in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1912. He has held over 40 patents and is best known as the inventor of the industrial robot. He also assisted in developing radar scanners and was part of the group that developed the first commerical microwave oven. John B. Fenn, was the winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2002. Read his Noble Prize autobiography in which he relates his experience growing up in Berea, Kentucky and the influences on his life. John Fitch was born in Connecticut in 1743. Although some sources list Robert Fulton as the inventor of the first steamboat, research has shown that John Fitch invented the first steamboat in the United States. A memorial in Bardstown, Kentucky pays tribute to the time the inventor lived there. Robert H. Grubbs, an American Nobel laureate, was born in Marshall County, Kentucky in 1942. He has won numerous awards and accolades in his life for his work as a chemist, receiving the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2005, (along with Yves Chauvin and Richard R. Schrock). He serves as a Professor of Chemistry at the California Institute of Technology. Read his Nobel Prize autobiography, or visit his Faculty Page at Cal Tech, for more information. John Andrew "Bud" Hillerich, maker of the Louisville Slugger. Baseball historians disagree as to who is actually responsible for creating the first baseball bat. However, Bud Hillerich and the Louisville Slugger have played a tremendously significant role in the history of baseball. We do know for certain that the name Louisville Slugger was registered as a trademark in 1894. Read a history of the bat on the web site of the Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory. William N. Lipscomb, Jr., the winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1976, was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1919. When he was an infant his family moved to Lexington, Kentucky where he grew up and attended university. For more information, read his Nobel Prize autobiography or visit his research page at Harvard University. Ephraim McDowell, (1771-1830), a physician and surgeon, was an innovator in abdominal surgery and a founder of Centre College in Danville, Kentucky.

Garrett Augustus Morgan, (pictured at left), was born in Paris, Kentucky in 1877, the son of former slaves. He moved to Cincinnati, Ohio during his teenage years and on to Cleveland in 1895, where he worked in sewing maching repair. In 1907, he opened his own repair shop which he expanded into tailoring and manufacturing of coats, dresses and suits, sewn on equipment, he himself had created. He also invented a zig-zag stitching attachment for manual sewing machines. Morgan is best known for patenting the first traffic signal in the U.S. and for a gas mask he invented and redesigned for use in World War I by U.S. soldiers. He died in 1963 at the age of 86 and is buried in Cleveland, Ohio.

Thomas Hunt Morgan, was born in Lexington, Kentucky in 1866 and died in Pasadena, California in 1945. An eminent geneticist and embroylogist, Morgan won numerous awards in his lifetime, claiming the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1933, (the first award given for genetics), for his research on the role of the chromosome in heredity. The Thomas Hunt Morgan School of Biological Sciences at the University of Kentucky is named for him. Read his Nobel Prize biography for more information on his significant research. Phillip Allen Sharp was born in Falmouth, Kentucky in 1944. He was a co-winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize in Medicine for his research in genetics. For more information, read his Nobel Prize autobiography, or visit his Faculty Research Page at MIT. George Speri Sperti, was born in Covington, Kentucky in 1900 and died in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1991 at the age of 91. He created a wide variety of products, holding over 100 patents during his lifeitime. His creations include: a process for increasing the vitamin-D content in milk; a process for freeze-drying orange juice concentrate; the K-vas meter, a device for measuring large-scale consumption of electricity; a meat tenderizer; the Sperti sunlamp; a various assortment of cosmetics and medical ointments and creams, including, Aspercreme, an analgesic ointment, and Preparation H, an ointment for hemorrhoid treatment. Nathan B. Stubblefield, was born in Murray, Kentucky in 1860. Sometimes called the "Father of Radio", he should instead be dubbed the "Father of Broadcasting". Stubblefield did not invent radio as we know it, as his device did not work by radio frequency. He did however invent wireless telephony which he publicly demonstrated in the early 1900's, making the first recorded broadcast of the human voice known in history. His experiments led to a patented wireless telephone in 1908. Stubblefied died in 1928 and is buried at Murray, Kentucky.

John Taliaferro Thompson, (pictured at left), was born in 1860 in Newport, Kentucky, the son of an Army lieutenant colonel. As a teenager, he decided that he wanted to follow in his father's footsteps and was accepted into the United States Military Academy. His military work in munitions and ordnance led Thompson to invent a submachine gun. After a distiguished military career, he retired in 1918, as a brigadier general. He died in 1940, at age 79, and is buried at West Point, New York, on the grounds of the United States Military Academy. The Thompson submachine gun, also called the "Tommy gun", was used extensively in World War II.

For More Information on American Inventions: See a Listing of Important American Inventions.