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Abstract

Patent and Trademark Resource Centers (PTRCs) support inventors, entrepreneurs, and researchers with patent and trademark information. Some PTRCs share regional patent history as part of their community outreach. This article focuses on PTRCs that have developed online databases and published works documenting regional patents, thereby providing hidden historical insights for historians, genealogists, and students. It spotlights the development of Georgiavation, a historic patent database developed by the PTRC at Georgia Southern University. Finally, this article offers guidance for libraries, museums, and other institutions interested in documenting their state or regional patent histories. This can result in a more inclusive narrative of innovation in the United States, supporting discussions around equity, regional business trends, and educational outreach. By documenting previously overlooked inventors, the project aligns with initiatives to promote racial equity and support underserved communities, reinforcing the importance of inclusive historical narratives in the context of technological innovation.

References

References by subjects

African-American Patent and Inventor Indexes and Histories

Collins, M. J. (2008). Black Inventors by State or Country of Residence, 1834-2008, Index. Historical, Regional and Specialized Patent and Trademark Research, Patent and Trademark Resource Center Association (PTRCA), https://ptrca.org/history/.

Department of the Interior: Patent Office. (1921). Records Relating to Colored Inventors, 1899-1921. National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD. Retrieved from: https://rediscovering-black-history.blogs.archives.gov/2013/11/05/wanted-colored-inventors/ AND https://catalog.archives.gov/id/7451732

Eschner, K. (2017). This Prolific Inventor Helped Give Us the Phrase “The Real McCoy.” Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved from: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/prolific-inventor-helped-give-us-phrase-real-mccoy-180963059/

Johnson, S. J. (2019). The Colorblind Patent System and Black Inventors. Landslide 11 (4), 38. Chicago: American Bar Association. Retrieved from: https://www.americanbar.org/groups/intellectual_property_law/publications/landslide/2018-19/march-april/colorblind-patent-system-black-inventors/ Note: Includes early black women inventors too.

Mason, J. L., (1973). Invisible No More: Black American Scientists and Inventors. Legacy ETDs. 272. Retrieved from: https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/etd_legacy/272

Oakes, R. (2023). Found on Baker’s List, Journeys of Innovation, USPTO website: https://www.uspto.gov/learning-and-resources/journeys-innovation/historical-stories/found-bakers-list

Schaller, F. H. (2006). African American Women Inventors, 1884-2003. Needham, MA; Arlington, VA: Frank H. Schaller. Includes inventor entries, references, and alphabetical and chronological indexes.

Schlipp, J. (2021, February 1). Our Rich History: Granville Woods, the black Thomas Edison, was noted inventor and held many patents. Northern Kentucky Tribune. Retrieved from: https://nkytribune.com/2021/02/our-rich-history-granville-woods-the-black-thomas-edison-was-noted-inventor-and-held-many-patents/

Confederate Patent and Inventor Indexes and Histories

Kenneth, D. (1994). A History of the Early Patent Offices: the Patent Office Pony. Appendix–Some Civil War Era Patents (pp. 206-216). Fredericksburg, VA: Sergeant Kirkland's Museum and Historical Society.

Knight, H. J. (2011). Confederate Invention: the Story of the Confederate States Patent Office and its Inventors. Baton Rogue, LA: LSU Press.

Knight, H. J. (2011). The Importance of Patents to Confederate Inventors. Journal of the Federal Circuit Historical Society 5, 81.

Genealogy and Patents

Comfort, J. (2001). Finding Grandpa’s patent: Using patent information for historical or genealogical research. Science & Technology Libraries: Patent and trademark information: uses and perspectives, 22(1-2), 39-56. Retrieved from http://pascal-francis.inist.fr/vibad/index.php?action=getRecordDetail&idt=15539827

D’Alto, N. (2004, April). Great-great-grandmothers of invention. Family Tree Magazine, 48-51. Retrieved from https://familytreemagazine.com/

Hertel, K. F. (2003). Idaho ghost towns: Patents as a key to the past. Intellectual Property (IP) Journal of the PTDLA, 3(1). Retrieved from https://web.archive.org/web/20081119161441/http://www.ptdla.org/journal/2003hertel

Lewin, H. (2024). Patents: A How-To-Find Guide, Iowa Patents. Iowa State University Library. Retrieved from Iowa Patents: https://instr.iastate.libguides.com/patents/iowa.

Melvin, T. (2002, Fall/Winter). Not just for inventors: Using patents for historical research. Documents to the People, 30: 22-27.

Rohan, D. (2005, Spring). Patents of invention as genealogical resources. HeritageQuestMagazine.com, 38-43.

Zastro, J. (2015). Genealogy: A cheat sheet for the unsuspecting librarian. Computers In Libraries, 35(5), 16-20. Retrieved from https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,shib&db=edsinc&AN=edsinc.A417473006

General Locally Developed and Local Collection Databases, Information Management

Martens, T. (2021, October). The Disclosure Function of the U.S. Patent System: Evidence from the PTDL Program and Extreme Snowfall. Review of Accounting Studies. 28, 237-264. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3347868 OR http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3347868

Mays, A. (2020). Legacy Missions in Times of Change: Defining and Shaping Collections in the 21st Century. In The Time Has Come . . . to Talk of Many Things: Charleston Conference Proceedings, 2019, edited by Beth R. Bernhardt, Leah H. Hinds, Lars Meyer, and Katina P. Strauch, 254–67. Purdue University Press. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv33t5ggk.48

AND https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/charleston/2019/collectiondevelopment/20/

Petralia, S., Balland, P. A., & Rigby, D. L. (2016). Unveiling the geography of historical patents in the United States from 1836 to 1975. Scientific data, 3, 160074. Available at PubMed: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5004586/ OR https://doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2016.74

Stvilia, B., et al. (2021). “Striking out on your own”--A study of research information management problems on university campuses. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology. 72(8), 963-978. https://asistdl.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/asi.24464

Vaughan, J. (2012). Investigations into Library Web-Scale Discovery Services. Information Technology and Libraries. (March), 32-82. Retrieved from: https://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/lib_articles/44/ AND https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,shib&db=lih&AN=76373324

Historic Patent/Inventor Databases

Andrews, M. J. (2021). Historical patent data: A practitioner’s guide. Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, 30(2), 368–397. https://doi.org/10.1111/jems.12414. Retrieved from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jems.12414.

Hampton, B. J. (2017). Directory of American Tool and Machinery Patents (DATAMP) [Database review]. Best Historical Materials: RUSA Historical Materials Committee, Reference & User Services Quarterly, 56(3), 207.

King, K. & Rohan, D. (2004). Creating a State Patent Database [Roundtable presentation handout]. Annual PTDL Training Seminar, Crystal City, Arlington, Virginia, March 19, 2004.

Patent and Trademark Depository Library Association, (2007, May 23). Patent Databases - Specialized and Historical, Retrieved from PTDLA website: https://web.archive.org/web/20070523060146/http://www.ptdla.org/statepatentdatabases.

Rohan, D., & Saunders, D. (2003). Inventing a Patent Database: Lessons Learned while Creating the Wyoming Inventors Database. Intellectual Property Journal of the PTDLA, 3 (1). Retrieved from: https://www.ptdla.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/rohan.pdf.

Historic Patent Indexes and Search Engines

Allen, R. (2015). Patent Reference Search, Pre 1920 Patentee Search, Historic Intellectual Property. Retrieved from: https://historicip.com/patents/refs.php

Leggett, M. D. (1874). Subject-matter Index of Patents for Inventions Issued by the United States Patent Office from 1790 to 1873, inclusive… (1874)

Patent & Trademark Resource Center Association (PTRCA). (2024). Historical, Regional and Specialized Patent and Trademark Research. This webpage lists historical, regional and specialized patent and trademark resources including historic inventor databases cited in this article. In addition, Excel spreadsheets of historic patent citation fields which could be utilized for initiating a state or regional database are included. Links to numerous Hathitrust historic patent indexes are featured too. Retrieved from: https://ptrca.org/history/

United States Department of Commerce. (1999). United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Name and Date Patents July 31, 1790-July 2, 1836. Washington, D.C.: Patent and Trademark Depository Library Program. Photocopy of a typed card file from the Public Search Room at the USPTO which served as one of the prior reference records of early unnumbered patents.

United States Patent Office. (1837-various years). Annual Report of the Commissioner of Patents.

Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office. Title varies over time of this annual patent listing. Public domain copies are available in various digital formats.

Institutional Repository Collections of Universities’ Issued Patents

Comfort, J. (2016). Documenting Your Institution's Patents: A case study from Clemson University. Journal of the Patent and Trademark Resource Center Association. Retrieved from: Retrieved from: https://ptrca.org/journal_article/comfort/

Edlund, H. G. (2023). A Case Study of the Complicated History of Rice University’s First Patents. Journal of the Patent and Trademark Resource Center Association, 33, (Article 2). Retrieved from: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/jptrca/vol33/iss1/2/

Reinman, S. & Ahrberg J. (2020). Issued Patents in a University’s Institutional Repository. Journal of the Patent and Trademark Resource Center Association. 30, (Article 5). Retrieved from: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/jptrca/vol30/iss1/5

Wesolek, A., et al. (2015). Collaborate to Innovate: Expanding Access to Faculty Patents through the Institutional Repository and the Library Catalog. Journal of Collection Management, 40(4). Retrieved from: http://works.bepress.com/jan_comfort/24/

Outreach to Promote Diversity: Independent Inventors and Entrepreneurs

Hayes-Rines, J. (2003). Independent Inventors: Who they are and How they use the PTDLs. Intellectual Property (IP) Journal of the PTDLA, 3(1). Retrieved from: https://www.ptdla.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/hayesrines.pdf

Irvin, D. (2018). The Patent Office in the Library. Public Services Quarterly, 14(4), 392-398. Economic development, public service outreach, networking, etc. Retrieved from: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,shib&db=lih&AN=137230167

Schlipp, J. (2007). Best Practices and InventorFest: Community Partners and Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries (PTDLs). Intellectual Property (IP) Journal of the PTDLA, 4(2). Retrieved from: https://ptrca.org/files/schlipp2007.pdf

Zwicky, D. & Stonebraker, I. (2020) A critical librarianship approach for teaching patent searching: Who becomes an inventor in America? Journal of Business & Finance Librarianship, 26(1-2), 113-125. DOI: 10.1080/08963568.2021.1872247

PTRC (PTDL) Backgrounders, Histories, Websites, etc.

Crockett Sneed, M. (1999). Fully disclosed yet merely descriptive: intricacies of training the patent and trademark information professional. Journal of Library Administration, 29(1).

Hoppenfeld, J. (2020). Patent and Trademark Resource Center Websites: A Content Analysis. Journal of the Patent and Trademark Resource Center Association. 30(2). Retrieved from: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/jptrca/vol30/iss1/2

Jenda, C. A. (2005/2006). Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries and the United States Patent and Trademark Office: A model for information dissemination. Resource Sharing & Information Networks. 18(1-2),183-201. Retrieved from: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,shib&db=edscal&AN=edscal.17136426

State and Regional (Geographical) Patent and Inventor History Sources

Alan, E. C. (2010). Texas Ingenuity: Lone Star Inventions, Inventions and Innovators. Mesquite, TX: Wag Books, LLC.

Butler, J.J. (1949). Agrarianism and Capitalism in Early Georgia (1732-1743). Groningen: Barkhuis. Chapter II: The Weaving of the Design, pp. 11-35, refers to the origins of the Trustee Garden of Savannah. Retrieved from: https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt22728g8.6

Dalton, C. (2001). How Ohio Helped Invent the World: From the Airplane to the Yo-Yo. Dayton, OH: Self Published by Curt Dalton.

Digital Public Library of America. (2024).Patent granted by the Georgia Assembly to Isaac Briggs and William Longstreet for their steam engine, 1789. (1789). Retrieved from the Digital Public Library of America, https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/full-steam-ahead-the-steam-engine-and-transportation-in-the-nineteenth-century/sources/1098.

Estill, J. H. (1870). Directory of the City of Savannah for 1870. Retrieved from Ancestry.com.

Estill, J. H. (1874/1875). Estill’s Savannah Directory, 1874-‘5. Retrieved from https://dlg.galileo.usg.edu/data/gsc/savcd/pdfs/gsc_savcd_lopl-scd-1874-75.pdf.

Georgia Archives, University of Georgia: Virtual Vault. (2024). Briggs and Longstreet’s Steam Engine Patent granted by the Georgia General Assembly, Vol. CCC, Bonds, Assembly, Colonial Government, RG 49-1-9. Retrieved from: https://vault.georgiaarchives.org/digital/collection/adhoc/id/125.

Georgia Historical Society. (2024). Georgia Historical Markers. “William Scarbrough: Promoter of the First Transoceanic Steamship.” Retrieved from: https://www.georgiahistory.com/ghmi_marker_updated/william-scarbrough/.

Georgia Humanities Council, et al. (2004). The New Georgia Encyclopedia. Athens, GA: Georgia Humanities Council and the University of Georgia Press. Retrieved from: https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/. Gillespie, M. & Delfino, S., eds. (2008). Technology, Innovation, and Southern Industrialization: From the Antebellum Era to the Computer Age. Columbia: University of Missouri Press. Introduction reference page 5 to Eli Whitney and the cotton gin and industrialization.

Haddock, T. M. (1871). Haddock’s Savannah, GA., Directory, and General Advertiser, 1871. Retrieved from https://dlg.galileo.usg.edu/data/gsc/savcd/pdfs/gsc_savcd_lopl-scd-1871.pdf

Khan, Z. & Sokoloff, K.L. (1993). Schemes of Practical Utility: Entrepreneurship and Innovation Among Great Inventors in the United States, 1790-1865. The Journal of Economic History 53(2), 289-307.

Knight, L L. (1917). A Standard History of Georgia and Georgians, volume I., p. 369. Chicago, New York: Lewis Pub. Co.

Schlipp, J. (2018, January 1). Our Rich History: Regional inventors–legendary toys, everyday health, home and more. Northern Kentucky Tribune. Retrieved from: https://nkytribune.com/2018/01/our-rich-history-regional-inventors-legendary-toys-everyday-health-home-and-more/.

Sergio, P., et al. (2016, August 30). Data Descriptor: Unveiling the geography of historical patents in the United States from 1836 to 1975. Scientific Data 3(160074), 1-14. Retrieved from: https://www.nature.com/articles/sdata201674

Sweet, J.A. (2009). A Misguided Mistake: The Trustees’ Public Garden in Savannah, Georgia. Georgia Historical Quarterly 93(1), 1-19.

United States. Bureau of the Census. (1860). Population Schedules of the Eight Census of the United States, 1860, Georgia, Chatham County, Savannah.

United States. Bureau of the Census. (1870). Population Schedules of the Ninth Census of the United States, 1870, Georgia, Chatman County, Savannah.

Women Patent and Inventor Indexes and Histories

Johnson, S. J. (2019). The Colorblind Patent System and Black Inventors. Landslide 11 (4), 727-737. Retrieved from: https://www.americanbar.org/groups/intellectual_property_law/publications/landslide/2018-19/march-april/colorblind-patent-system-black-inventors/ Includes African-American women inventors.

Khan, B. Z. (2000). “Not for Ornament”: Patenting Activity by Nineteenth-Century Women Inventors. The Journal of Interdisciplinary History. 31 (2), 159-195. Retrieved from: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,shib&db=edsjsr&AN=edsjsr.207141

Pilato, D. E. (2000). The Revival of a Legacy: Nineteenth-Century American Women Inventors. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger. Reference to Catherine Greene’s support of Eli Whitney and his patent for the Cotton Gin, pp. 57-59.

Schaller, F. H. (2006). African American Women Inventors, 1884-2003. Needham, MA; Arlington, VA: Frank H. Schaller. Includes inventor entries, references, and alphabetical and chronological indexes.

Thorne, D. (2019). Hidden in History: the untold stories of women during the industrial revolution. Ocala, Florida: Atlantic Publishing Group, Inc. Reference to Catherine Greene’s support of Eli Whitney and his patent for the Cotton Gin, pp.14-15.

United States Patent Office. (1888). Women Inventors to Whom Patents Have Been Granted by the United States Government. 1790 to July 1, 1888. Compiled under the direction of the Commissioner of Patents. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.

X-Patents (Name and Date Patents)

Chartrand, S. (2004, August 9). Patents; the earliest U.S. patents went up in smoke. but a few are still being recovered, even 168 years after the fire. New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/09/business/patents-earliest-us-patents-went-up-smoke-but-few-are-still-being-recovered-even.html

Hampton, B. J. (2021). Stalking the Wild X Patent. Journal of the Patent and Trademark Resource Center Association, 31 (4) Retrieved from: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/jptrca/vol31/iss1/4

United States Department of Commerce. (1999). United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Name and Date Patents July 31, 1790-July 2, 1836. Washington, D.C.: Patent and Trademark Depository Library Program. Photocopy of a typed card file from the Public Search Room at the USPTO which served as one of the prior reference records of early unnumbered patents.

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