Hannah Slater

Hannah Slater (; 1774–1812) was an early American inventor. Some sources state that she was the first American woman to receive a patent, or Mary Kies, in 1809, was the first. This mill has been preserved as a historical site and is known as the Slater Mill Historic Site.

Adult life

Invention In 1793, Samuel Slater showed Hannah some very smooth yarn he had spun from long staple Surinam cotton. While Samuel intended to use this yarn to produce cloth, Hannah and her sister saw a different potential. Using a hand spinning wheel, they spun the yarn into thread, which turned out to be stronger than traditional linen thread. The same year, Hannah applied to the U.S. Patent Office for a patent for an invention - a new method of producing sewing thread from cotton. The patent was issued in the name of "Mrs Samuel Slater".

Community work Slater was active in religious and welfare organizations in the Pawtucket community, such as the creation of a village Sunday School, and in 1809 a Female Beneficent Society. Slater was treasurer for the society, and her sister Lydia was one of its directors.

Family Slater gave birth to 10 children, four of whom died in infancy or childhood. The known children and their years of birth are William (b. 1796), Elizabeth (b. 1798), Mary (b. 1801), Samuel (b. 1802), George (b. 1804), John (b. 1805), Horatio (b. 1808), William (b. 1809) and Thomas (b. 1812).

Slater died in 1812 about two weeks after the birth of her last child, from complications of childbirth. She was 37 years old. Her husband wrote in his memoirs that after her death "the poor lamented her, whose charities and kindness they had experienced". Slater was buried at Mineral Spring Cemetery.