Samuel Hopkins (December 9, 1743 – 1818) was an American

inventor An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea, or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...

from

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

, On July 31, 1790, he was granted the first U.S.

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

, under the new U.S. patent statute just signed into law by President Washington on April 10, 1790. Hopkins had petitioned for a patent on an improvement "in the making of

Potash Potash ( ) includes various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water- soluble form.

and Pearlash by a new Apparatus and Process." The statute did not create a

Patent Office A patent office is a governmental or intergovernmental organization which controls the issue of patents. In other words, "patent offices are government bodies that may grant a patent or reject the patent application based on whether the applicati ...

. Instead a committee of the Secretary of State,

Secretary of War The secretary of war was a member of the U.S. president's Cabinet, beginning with George Washington's administration. A similar position, called either "Secretary at War" or "Secretary of War", had been appointed to serve the Congress of the ...

and the

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were authorized to make a decision on the merit of a properly documented petition. The patent was signed by

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George Washington George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...

, Attorney General

Edmund Randolph Edmund Jennings Randolph (August 10, 1753 September 12, 1813) was a Founding Father of the United States, attorney, and the seventh Governor of Virginia. As a delegate from Virginia, he attended the Constitutional Convention and helped to cre ...

, and Secretary of State

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. The other U.S. patents issued that year were for a new

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-making process and

Oliver Evans Oliver Evans (September 13, 1755 – April 15, 1819) was an American inventor, engineer, and businessman born in rural Delaware and later rooted commercially in Philadelphia. He was one of the first Americans to build steam engines and an advo ...

's flour-milling machinery. Hopkins also received the first "Canadian" patent from the Parliament of

Lower Canada The Province of Lower Canada () was a British colonization of the Americas, British colony on the lower Saint Lawrence River and the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence established in 1791 and abolished in 1841. It covered the southern portion o ...

in 1791, issued "by the Governor General in Council to Angus MacDonnel, a Scottish soldier garrisoned at

Quebec City Quebec City is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the Census Metropolitan Area (including surrounding communities) had a populati ...

, and to Samuel Hopkins, for processes to make potash and soap from wood ash."

Personal details

Samuel Hopkins, the second child of

Quaker Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations. Members refer to each other as Friends after in the Bible, and originally, others referred to them as Quakers ...

parents, was born just north of

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. At about the age of 16, he was apprenticed to Robert Parrish, a Quaker tradesman in Philadelphia. In the spring of 1765, Hopkins married Parrish's sister-in-law, Hannah Wilson, and together they raised six children in Philadelphia. The 1790 U.S. Census listed Hopkins's occupation as "Pott Ash Maker". The city directories of the period listed him as a "pot-ash maker" and a "pot-ash manufacturer". Circa 1800, for financial reasons, Hopkins and his wife moved to

Rahway, New Jersey Rahway () is a city (New Jersey), city in southern Union County, New Jersey, Union County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. A bedroom community of New York City, it is centrally located in the Rahway River, Rahway Valley region, in the New ...

, to live with their daughter Sarah and son-in-law William Shotwell. They returned to Philadelphia sometime before Hopkins's death in 1818.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hopkins, Samuel 1743 births 1818 deaths 18th-century American inventors People from Philadelphia People from Pittsford, Vermont History of patent law Inventors from Pennsylvania