Why We Named our ‘Women Leaders in Innovation Award’ After a New Jersey Woman Who Was Never Recognized The New Jersey Chamber of Commerce is naming its “Women Leaders in Innovation Award” after Alice H. Parker, an innovator from Morristown who in 1919 developed an early concept of the modern home heating system. Parker was never properly recognized for her idea, likely because she was a woman, and an African-American, at a time in history when neither of those attributes were embraced as innovators. That’s why it’s fitting that the first recipient of the N.J. Chamber’s Alice H. Parker Women Leaders in Innovation Award will be going to Shirley Ann Jackson, an AfricanAmerican woman who has spent a career tearing down gender and racial barriers. Jackson is a former Bell Labs theoretical physicist, a stateswoman and currently president of the prestigious Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). She has served two U.S. presidents as an advisor in the fields of intelligence gathering and science. She is the first African-American woman to receive a doctorate from MIT, in any field. And she has been called “perhaps the ultimate role model for women in science” in Time magazine. Jackson will receive the award at the N.J. Chamber’s Innovation Gala on Oct. 26 at The Palace at Somerset (to read more about Jackson, see her profile on page 14). And when Jackson receives it, Alice H. Parker will finally be recognized. Parker’s Contribution Parker deserves recognition. Her patented concept was the precursor to the thermostat and the familiar forced air furnaces in most homes today, replacing what was then the most common method for heating – cutting and burning wood in fireplaces or stoves. But beyond the information on her patent, there is very little we know about this pioneer. There are few records of her life, family and friends. In fact, nobody knows if she has descendants. After her patent, she practically disappeared. Parker lived in Morristown, according to the patent she filed. She took classes at Howard University, the university has confirmed. A copy of a patent granted to her on Dec. 23, 1919, contains her technical design for a natural gasfueled “new and improved heating furnace.” And while the idea of centralized heating was not new – the ancient Romans used a very basic version of it – Parker’s idea was the first time anyone had thought of using natural gas for home heating. Her intricate design is akin to the “zoned” heating systems in use today. Using gas as fuel, it sought to draw air from a single cold air box into individual heating units, which then delivered the air through ducts into
Alice Parker
various parts of the house. Parker’s patent is mentioned in the book African American Firsts in Science and Technology (Gale, 1999) by Raymond B. Webster, and on the website About.com. Pictures of her can be found online. So while her heating furnace idea was revolutionary, just as revolutionary is the idea of a black, female inventor of that era receiving a patent, said Neal Brunson, director of the Afro-American Historical Society at the Greenville Public Library in Jersey City. He, like leaders of most historical societies contacted, had not heard of Parker until Enterprise magazine inquired about her. “This represents a break from the industrial and domestic labor that most African-Americans were doing at that time,” Brunson told reporter Alicia Brooks Waltman for her piece in Enterprise magazine last year. “This [also] is a break from the culture of a woman who is supposed to be in the home. Instead, [Parker] is out inventing a product. And not just any product, a complicated, technical product.” He added, “A woman was not supposed to be doing this – an African-American woman, especially.” Well, Alice Parker of New Jersey did it. So on Oct. 26, we will honor Dr. Shirley Anne Jackson for her outstanding career in science, and for receiving the inaugural Alice H. Parker’s Women Leaders in Innovation Award. And we will recognize Alice H. Parker for her outstanding innovation in the area of modern home heating. Parker’s name will be attached to this annual award from this day forward – a tribute to a lost innovator. ◆ ENTERPRISE 3Q 2015 | 13