Thomas Davenport

Thomas Davenport was an American blacksmith from Williamstown, Vermont, born July 9, 1802 and died July 6, 1851, who became one of the first people anywhere to build a practical electric motor. After visiting an iron works and studying an electromagnet built to Joseph Henry's design, he and his wife Emily built their own improved version, reportedly using silk from her wedding dress for the windings, and in 1834 completed what is credited as the first American direct-current electric motor. The couple used a battery-powered motor of this kind to drive a miniature model car around a track, one of the earliest attempts to apply electricity to locomotion, and in 1837 Davenport received the first American patent issued for an electric machine. In 1840 he also produced the first magazine printed using electrically powered equipment, called The Electro-Magnetic and Mechanics' Intelligencer, though he was never able to turn his early lead in electric motors into a lasting business before his death at forty-eight.