Born into slavery in 1850, Sarah E. Goode was the first African American woman to be granted a patent by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. After being freed from slavery at the end of the Civil War, Goode moved to Chicago, where she started a career as an entrepreneur. With her husband Archibald, a carpenter, Goode opened a furniture store. Interestingly, Goode’s patent for a folding cabinet bed, granted in 1885, was the result of her having a working class clientele who often lived in apartments with limited space., for her invention of a folding cabinet bed in 1885. Goode died in 1905.
Source: http://www.frostillustrated.com/2016/womens-history-often-overlooked/
