Who invented the folding ironing board?
The first patent filed specifically for a folding ironing table was by MG Briggs in 1868. Other inventors who created variations on the folding ironing board included Henry Soggs in 1869 and J.H. Mallory in 1871. Some dispute has arisen over who invented the ironing board because of the widespread attribution of its creation to Sarah Boone, an African-American woman who received an ironing board patent in 1892. Boone”s ironing board was designed specifically for sleeves. However, in a bizarre twist, Boone has been incorrectly championed as the inventor of the ironing board even by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which declared her the inventor of the “predecessor to the modern ironing board” in an April, 2002, press release. This pronouncement has received much attention from America’s white supremacist movement, which has used the Internet to debunk Boone’s role in ironing board history.
