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Author Snider, Jill D., author

Title Lucean Arthur Headen : the making of a black inventor and entrepreneur / Jill D. Snider
Published Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 2020

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Description 1 online resource
Summary "Born in Carthage, North Carolina, Lucean Arthur Headen (1879-1957) grew up amid former slave artisans. Inspired by his grandfather, a wheelwright, and great-uncle, a toolmaker, he dreamed as a child of becoming an inventor. His ambitions suffered the menace of Jim Crow and the reality of a new inventive landscape in which investment was shifting from lone inventors to the new 'industrial scientists.' But determined and ambitious, Headen left the South, and after toiling for a decade as a Pullman porter, risked everything to pursue his dream. He eventually earned eleven patents, most for innovative engine designs and anti-icing methods for aircraft. An equally capable entrepreneur and sportsman, Headen learned to fly in 1911, manufactured his own 'Pace Setter' and 'Headen Special' cars in the early 1920s, and founded the first national black auto racing association in 1924, all establishing him as an important authority on transportation technologies among African Americans. Emigrating to England in 1931, Headen also proved a successful manufacturer, operating engineering firms in Surrey that distributed his motor and other products worldwide for twenty-five years. Though Headen left few personal records, Jill D. Snider recreates the life of this extraordinary man through historical detective work in newspapers, business and trade publications, genealogical databases, and scholarly works"-- Provided by publisher
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Print version record
Subject Headen, L. A
SUBJECT Headen, L. A
Subject African American inventors -- United States -- Biography
African American automobile industry workers -- Great Britain -- Biography
African American automobile industry workers -- United States -- Biography
African Americans -- History -- 20th century -- Biography
BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY -- Cultural Heritage.
African American automobile industry workers
African American inventors
African Americans
Great Britain
United States
Genre/Form Electronic books
Biographies
History
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9781469654379
1469654377
9781469654362
1469654369