Who Was Garrett Morgan?

Garrett Augustus Morgan, an African-American inventor, was born in Kentucky in1877 to former slaves Sydney Morgan and Elizabeth Reed Morgan, who had ten other children. Garrett was their seventh child. Despite his long work days on the farm, he also attended school. But to make a living, he had to quit school at 14 and move to Cincinnati, Ohio to work as a handyman. That did not discourage him – he hired a tutor and continued learning.

Mr. Morgan eventually moved to Cleveland and became prosperous as a sewing machine repairman with his own clothing manufacturing business that employed more than 30 people. Later, he established the Cleveland Call, a successful newspaper. He also had an excellent imagination, so he invented things that we still use today. One of them was the zig-zag stitching attachment for the sewing machine. He also invented an early version of the gas mask. When there was an explosion in a tunnel under Lake Erie, Mr. Morgan volunteered to rescue the trapped workers, using his new invention to protect against the deadly fumes. It became an instant success, and he was given the Medal of Bravery by the citizens of Cleveland. However, he was turned down for the Carnegie Medal partly because he was black.

As an early owner of an automobile, Mr. Morgan began thinking that roads could be much safer if they had a better signaling device at intersections. At that time, everyone used the roads – autos, wagons, streetcars, horses, bikes and pedestrians. The existing signals said only “stop” and “go,” which meant that pedestrians were left to compete with all the other traffic. So Garrett Morgan invented a hand-cranked signal that would control traffic at an intersection, and then it would stop all traffic to allow pedestrians to cross. Just before his death in 1963, the U.S. government gave him an award for his invention.

Garrett Morgan married Madge Nelson in 1896, though they were divorced two years later. In 1908 he married Mary Hasek, and they had three sons, John P., Garrett A., Jr., and Cosmo H. Morgan. Some of his descendants live in the Oakland, California area.