dmitted to the medical school at Harvard. He became
distinguished for his work in a cholera epidemic in Pittsburgh in 1854.
It was of course not until after the Civil War that medical departments
were established in connection with some of the new higher institutions
of learning for Negro students.

[Footnote 1: Kelly Miller: "The Background of the Negro Physician,"
_Journal of Negro History_, April, 1916, quoting in part Woodson: _The
Education of the Negro prior to 1861_.]

Before 1860 a situation that arose more than once took from Negroes the
real credit for inventions. If a slave made an invention he was not
permitted to take out a patent, for no slave could make a contract. At
the same time the slave's master could not take out a patent for him,
for the Government would not recognize the slave as having the legal
right to make the assignment to his master. It is certain that Negroes,
who did most of the mechanical work in the South before the Civil War,
made more than one suggestion for the improvement of machinery. We have
already referred to the strong claim put forth by a member of the race
for the real credit of the cotton-gin. The honor of being the first
Negro to be granted a patent belongs to Henry Blair, of Maryland, who in
1834 received official protection for a corn harvester.

Throughout the century there were numerous attempts at poetical
composition, and several booklets were published. Perhaps the most
promising was George Horton's _The Hope of Liberty_, which appeared in
1829. Unfortunately, Horton could not get the encouragement that he
needed and in course of time settled down to the life of a janitor at
the University of North Carolina.[1] Six years before the war Frances
Ellen Watkins (later Mrs. Harper) struck the popular note by readings
from her _Miscellaneous Poems_, which ran through several editions.
About the same time William Wells Brown was prominent, though he also
worked for several years after the war. He was a man of decided talent
and had traveled considerably. He wrote several books dealing with Negro
history and biography; and he also treated racial subjects in a novel,
_Clotel_, and in a drama, _The Escape_. The latter suffers from an
excess of moralizing, but several times it flashes out with the quality
of genuine drama, especially when it deals with the jealousy of a
mistress for a favorite slave and the escape of the latter with her
husband. In 1841 the first Negro magazin