Margaret Knight’s had favourite tools, and she loved to tinker with them to create things – she made kites and sleds for her brothers. Knight had the unique ability to design and build gadgets. When she was 12 years old, she visited her brothers at the cotton textile mill where they worked. During her visit, while watching the heavy steel-tipped shuttles move on the large looms, a loom malfunctioned and a shuttle flew out and hit a worker injuring him. She designed a safety device to turn off the entire machine when something malfunctioned.
When Knight died in 1914, she had acquired at least 27 patents – for products including window frames, improvements to engines, machines for cutting shoe soles and machinery for folding and gluing square bottomed bags – and made about 90 inventions. Not bad for a woman with little formal education who grew up in the industrial era.
Name: Margaret Eloise Knight
Birth Date: February 1838 – October 1914
Job Functions: American Inventor
Known For: Inventing a machine to make square bottomed paper bags
Margaret Knight Mini Biography
Many people do not know about American inventor Margaret E. Knight. If you do a quick search on her, and read through the results of the search, you will not find substantive amounts of information that you can sink your teeth into.
Despite that, for a woman with little formal education who grew up during the industrial era, she did very well for herself – a variation of her paper bag design is still being used today, nearly a century and three-quarters later.
Margaret E. Knight was a great problem solver and innovator. When she was 12 years old, while visiting her brothers at the cotton textile mill where they worked, the loom malfunctioned and injured a worker. Knight created a device to shut off the entire machine whenever it malfunctioned. Her invention instantly reduced the number of deaths and injuries in the factory.
While working for the Columbia Paper Bag Company in Springfield, Massachusetts, the paper bags at the time were either envelop-shaped, narrow and flimsy, or were flat-bottomed and made by hand. For years, men had tried to design a machine that would create flat-bottomed bags inexpensively.
Knight did what these men couldn’t do, she invented a new machine that would automatically fold and glue paper bags to create square bottoms. She conceived of the idea for her paper bag machine maker in 1867. She spent months working out the design for a machine and had many drawings for her design. Knight spent two years perfecting the design.
Margaret Knight: Girl Inventor
Marvelous MattieMargaret Knight and the Paper Bag
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Not surprisingly, Knight built a wooden prototype of her paper bag making invention and tested it, but she needed an iron one to apply for the patent. In 1869, she traveled to Boston from Springfield, Massachusetts, where she lived and worked to supervise the manufacturing of her final prototype. While she was in the machine shop, Charles F. Annan another inventor saw her prototype and how it worked, and quickly created his own device then patented it.
Even though at the time, it was a common belief that women didn’t know much about machines and how they worked, Knight did not lie down and allow Annan to get away with stealing her invention. Instead, she fought back with a patent interference lawsuit.
During the lawsuit, Annan and his lawyer claimed that women didn’t have adequate knowledge about machines to be able to create such a sophisticated machine. Fortunately for Knight, she had documentation, and those who were involved with her at various stages in the process testified on her behalf. And in 1870 the dispute was settled in her favour.
That same year, along with a businessman, Knight founded Eastern Paper Bag Company in Hartford, Connecticut to profit from latest invention. Once again she faced gender discrimination, the workers at the factory where the bags were to be made refused to take instructions from her on how to install the machine because they believed that women didn’t understand machinery.
This invention had such a global impact because it was instantly used worldwide, that in 1871, Knight was decorated by Queen Victoria of England. Knight's original box-making machine is in the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C.
Margaret Knight’s Inventions Include:
- Dress and skirt shield – 1883
- Clasp for robes – 1884
- Reel for spinning or sewing machine – 1884
- Barbecue Spit (Long pointed tool used to skewer meat for cooking) – 1885
- Several sole-cutting machines for shoemaking – 1890
- Numbering machine – 1894
- Window frame and sash – 1894
- Rotary engine – 1902
Between 1902 and 1915, Knight received patents for a series of components for rotary engines and motors – one was awarded after her death – and the sleeve-valve (type of valve mechanism for piston engines) automotive engine was her most notable invention in this category. She made improvements to internal combustion engines. Knight’s lack of formal education prevented her from understanding the principles behind her inventions. She was more concerned with practical application and not scientific theories.
Margaret E. Knight lacked business savvy; she sold the rights to many of her inventions to the companies that employed her. For instance, she sold many of the rights for her rotary engines and motor inventions to Knight-Davidson Motor Company of New York a company she had affiliations with. When Knight died, her estate was valued at a mere $275.
Knight’s most notable invention is the device that folded and glued paper to form the flat-bottomed brown paper bags which are still used today.
Margaret Knight Steps to Success
- Margaret Knight was not a financial success, but she left the world a better place than she found it. She was a great problem solver and innovator and was more concerned with applying science than studying theories.
- She solved problems in her workplace and around her.
- Some of the devices she created were safety and time-saving devices.
Lessons from Margaret Knight
- Look around you, what problems need to be solved? Start solving them.
- Lack of sufficient education should not be a barrier to success.
- Document your work.
- Thoroughly understand your work, both the theoretical and practical aspects.
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Have you read?
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Sources Cited/References
Science and its Times, Volume 6
American Women in Technology, an Encyclopedia
Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science
Dictionary of Women Worldwide
Women's History Month, Prolific Female Inventors of the Industrial Era, MIT University, http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/whm2.html
Margaret E. Knight Biography, Book Rags, http://www.bookrags.com/biography/margaret-e-knight-woi/
Margaret Knight – Queen of Paper Bags, About.com Inventors, http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blknight.htm
Women in World History
If someone clicks on a link and buys something from Amazon, the company will pay me a small commission. First published in August 2011.
