Born on February 14, 1838, in York, Maine, Margaret Knight grew up there and in Manchester, New Hampshire. From an early age she demonstrated a knack for tools and invention, and she was said to have contrived a safety device for controlling shuttles in powered textile looms when she was twelve. In 1868, at which time she was living in Springfield, Massachusetts, she invented an attachment for paper-bag folding machines that allowed them to produce square-bottomed bags. After working to improve her invention in Boston she patented it in 1870. She later moved to Ashland, Massachusetts, and there received patents for a dress and skirt shield in 1883, a clasp for robes in 1884, and a spit in 1885. Later still, in Framingham, Massachusetts, she received six patents over a span of years for machines used in the manufacturing of shoes.
Other inventions of hers included a numbering machine and a window frame and sash, both patented in 1894, and several devices relating to rotary engines, patented between 1902 and 1915. While not the first woman to receive a patent, Margaret Knight was one of the most prolific of women inventors, with about 27 patents to her credit, and unusual in her interest in heavy machinery. She failed to profit much from her work, however. She died in Framingham, Massachusetts, on October 12, 1914, and was called in a local obituary a ╥woman Edison.╙
