As part of our mission, Hagley seeks to inspire all people to be innovative in their own lives. In our collections, find evidence of the innovation that has shaped American history. We welcome you to investigate and explore our historical collections on invention.
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World’s Fairs
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Meet Hagley at the fair! Since the mid-1800s, world’s fairs have shown billions of people new inventions and visions of the future. Hagley’s collections include books, brochures, posters, trade cards, and other items from over 100 international expos. The collections also feature photos, Joly Color plates, artifacts, and records about business exhibits from various world’s fairs. |
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Patent models |
Show off your invention with a patent model. These models were part of the American patent application process for a century. Hagley has thousands of these beautiful models from a variety of inventors and industries. |
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Industrial research |
According to our research, the Directors of Industrial Research records cover the development of R&D in the United States. Hagley also holds extensive documentation on research programs of industrial giants such as DuPont and RCA. |
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| Intellectual property | Protect your ideas in international trade discussions with the Intellectual Property Committee records. Hagley also holds innovation documentation for thousands of companies like DuPont, RCA, MCI, and Sperry. | |
Technological history |
Learn how technologies change over time at Hagley. Our holdings range from a fifteenth century manuscript on fireworks to records from a modern biotechnology firm. Our historical strengths, though, span the early nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. We also spotlight the rise of the history of technology as a field. We preserve the papers and libraries from trailblazing historians like Eugene S. Ferguson and Thomas P. Hughes. |
Research guidesLearn more about our collections relating to innovation history. |
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Women Entrepreneurs, Inventors, and Innovators |
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Postcard for the 1939 New York World's Fair (Acc. 2013.205).
Explore FurtherSelected digital resources related to innovation history at Hagley.
Oscar Guttmann collection on explosives, firearms, and military science World’s Fairs: A Global History of Expositions (subscription database) Crawford H. Greenewalt's Manhattan Project diaries History of Kevlar oral histories Hologic Digital Mammography oral histories
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Page from Crawford H. Greenewalt's Manhattan Project notebooks, December 1943 (Acc. 1889). |
Top image credits (left to right): Improvement in Wire Rolling Machines, invented by David Shaw and David Spence of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, patented 1878 (Patent 202,670). E.I. du Pont design drawing for pounding mill gearing, early nineteenth century (Acc. LMSS:IX). Fountains at the 1889 Exposition Universelle Internationale in Paris, 1892 (Call number * ff N4803 .A86). Chemist and Kevlar inventor Stephanie Kwolek, circa 1990 (Acc. 2014.202).