Garrett Morgan blazed a trail for Black inventors with his patents, including those for an improved traffic light and a breathing device that preceded the World War I gas mask.
A prolific inventor who called himself the “Black Edison,” Garrett Morgan created early versions of the traffic light and gas mask. He began his career as a sewing-machine mechanic before patenting an improved sewing machine design and a hair-straightening product, among other inventions. His breathing device, known as a safety hood, later provided the blueprint for World War I gas masks. In 1923, Morgan invented a safer traffic light. The notable Black inventor, who lived much of his life in Ohio, died in July 1963 at age 86. Chinese Truck Part
FULL NAME: Garrett Augustus Morgan BORN: March 4, 1877 DIED: July 27, 1963 BIRTHPLACE: Paris, Kentucky SPOUSES: Madge Nelson (1896-1898) and Mary Hasek (1908-1963) CHILDREN: John, Garrett, and Cosmo ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Pisces
Born in Paris, Kentucky, on March 4, 1877, Garrett Augustus Morgan was the seventh of 11 children. His mother, Elizabeth Reed, was of Indian and African descent and the daughter of a Baptist minister. His father, Sydney, a formerly enslaved man freed in 1863, was the son of John Hunt Morgan, a Confederate colonel. Morgan’s mixed-race heritage would play a part in his business dealings as an adult.
When Morgan was in his mid-teens, he moved to Cincinnati to look for work and found it as a handyman to a wealthy landowner. Although he only completed an elementary school education, Morgan paid for more lessons from a private tutor. Jobs at several sewing-machine factories soon captured his imagination and helped determined his future.
One of Morgan’s first inventions involved the sewing machine. After learning the inner workings of the machines and how to fix them at his factory jobs, Morgan obtained a patent for an improved sewing machine and opened his own repair business. Morgan’s business was a success; it enabled him to marry his second wife, Mary Hasek, and establish himself in Cleveland. Following the momentum of his business success, Morgan’s patented sewing machine soon paved the way to his financial freedom, albeit in a rather unorthodox way.
In 1909, Morgan was working with sewing machines in his newly opened tailoring shop—a business he had opened with Mary, who had experience as a seamstress—when he encountered woolen fabric that had been scorched by a sewing-machine needle. It was a common problem at the time since sewing-machine needles ran at such high speeds. In hopes of alleviating the problem, Morgan experimented with a chemical solution in an effort to reduce friction created by the needle and subsequently noticed that the hairs of the cloth were straighter.
After trying his solution to good effect on a neighboring dog’s fur, Morgan finally tested the concoction on himself. When that worked, he quickly established the G.A. Morgan Hair Refining Company and sold the cream to African Americans. The company was incredibly successful, bringing Morgan financial security and allowing him to pursue other interests.
In 1914, Morgan patented a breathing device, or “safety hood,” providing its wearers with a safer breathing experience in the presence of smoke, gases, and other pollutants. Morgan worked hard to market the device, especially to fire departments, often personally demonstrating its reliability in fires. Morgan’s breathing device became the prototype and precursor for the gas masks used during World War I, protecting soldiers from toxic gas used in warfare. The invention earned him the first prize at the Second International Exposition of Safety and Sanitation in New York City.
There was some resistance to Morgan’s devices among buyers, particularly in the South, where racial tension remained palpable despite advancements in civil rights for Black Americans. In an effort to counteract the resistance to his products, Morgan hired a white actor to pose as “the inventor” during presentations of his breathing device. Morgan then posed as the inventor’s sidekick, disguised as a Native American man named Big Chief Mason. Wearing his hood, Morgan entered areas otherwise unsafe for breathing. The tactic was successful. Sales of the device were quick to materialize, especially from firefighters and rescue workers.
The voracious inventor didn’t stop with his early gas mask design. His penchant for fixing problems turned his attention to all kinds of things, from hats to belt fasteners to car parts. The first Black man in Cleveland to own a car, Morgan worked on his mechanical skills and developed a friction drive clutch.
Then, in 1923, he created a new kind of traffic signal, one with a warning light to alert drivers that they would need to stop. He invented the device after witnessing a carriage accident at a particularly problematic intersection in Cleveland. Morgan quickly acquired patents for his traffic signal—a rudimentary version of the modern three-way traffic light—in the United States, Britain, and Canada but eventually sold the rights to General Electric for $40,000.
Despite poor health in his later year, Morgan continued work on inventions. His last was a self-extinguishing cigarette that had a water-filled plastic pellet placed just before the filter.
A tragic accident in 1916 proved to be another opportunity for Morgan and his safety hood to come to the rescue. That year, the city of Cleveland was drilling a new tunnel under Lake Erie for a fresh water supply. Workers hit a pocket of natural gas, which resulted in a huge explosion that trapped workers underground amid suffocating noxious fumes and dust.
When Morgan heard about the explosion, he and his brother put on breathing devices and made their way into the tunnel as quickly as possible. The brothers managed to save two lives and recover four bodies before the rescue effort was shut down.
Despite his heroic efforts, the publicity that Morgan garnered from the incident hurt sales. The public was now fully aware that Morgan was Black, and many refused to purchase his products. Adding to the detriment, neither the inventor nor his brother were fully recognized for their heroic efforts at Lake Erie—possibly another effect of racial discrimination. Morgan was nominated for a Carnegie Medal for his efforts but ultimately wasn’t chosen to receive the award. Additionally, some reports of the explosion named others as the rescuers.
Outside of his inventing career, Morgan diligently supported the African American community throughout his lifetime. He was a member of the newly formed NAACP, was active in the Cleveland Association of Colored Men, donated to Black colleges, and opened an all-Black country club. Additionally, in 1920, he launched the Cleveland Call, an African American newspaper later named the Call and Post.
Morgan was married twice and a father to three sons.
His first marriage was with Madge Nelson. Little is documented about their union, which began in 1896 and ended only two years later.
Morgan had a much more substantial relationship with his second wife, Mary Hasek, whom he married in 1908. They had three children together: John, Garrett, and Cosmo.
Hasek’s family had immigrated to the United States from the modern day Czech Republic in 1893, and Mary found work as a sewer in a tailor ship. As a white woman, her relationship with Morgan was met with derision. After their marriage, Mary’s father had her excommunicated from the Catholic church, meaning her siblings had to visit her in secrecy.
The Morgans valued family time and hosted dinner in their home in Cleveland every Sunday night (with attendance mandatory). Garrett Sr. also heavily invested in his sons’ education, offering them opportunities unavailable in his youth.
Morgan began developing glaucoma in 1943 and lost most of his sight as a result. He suffered from other health problems, which he believed were attributed to toxins present at the Cleveland tunnel disaster. Just before his death, Morgan was honored by the U.S. government for his traffic signal invention.
The accomplished inventor died in Cleveland on July 27, 1963, after battling “a lingering illness,” according to his obituary in the Pittsburgh Courier. His death at age 86 came shortly before the celebration of the Emancipation Proclamation centennial, an event he had been awaiting in Chicago.
Morgan is buried at Cleveland’s Lake View Cemetery, which is also the final resting place of former President James Garfield, Prohibition enforcer Eliot Ness, and business titan John D. Rockefeller.
Morgan improved and saved countless lives worldwide, including those of firefighters, soldiers, and vehicle operators, with his profound inventions. And he was eventually restored to his place in history as a hero of the Lake Erie rescue. His work provided the blueprint for many important advancements that came later and continues to inspire and serve as a basis for research conducted by modern-day inventors and engineers.
In 2005, Morgan was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in Akron, Ohio. His prototype traffic signal is on display at the African American Museum in Cleveland, and the Garrett Morgan School of Engineering and Innovation in the city is named in his honor.
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