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Patent holder profile

Miriam E. Benjamin and the gong and signal chair patent

Benjamin's 1888 signal-chair patent is explicitly added to Backlog 3 as a service-infrastructure and Black women patentees profile.

Why this belongs on CultureUp

Benjamin is a public-record memory story.

Benjamin belongs here because the patent record shows Black women inventors working in service and signal infrastructure.

Backlog priority 6 / chronology not finalStatus: source_reviewedSource grade: B+

Patent: 386289: Gong and Signal Chair
Issue date: 1888-07-17
Place: Washington, D.C.
Record strength: Medium-high patent-record strength for number, title, date, and Washington, D.C. place anchor.
Identity evidence: Publishable as a source-led profile; institutional adoption and later career claims need separate sources.
Backlog priority: 6 / not chronological rank
Chronology caution: Backlog priority 6 is not chronological rank.
Identity caution: Do not infer complete biography, first-language, or institutional adoption from the patent row alone.
Why this record matters: The record makes service signals, public seating, and call systems visible as technical public memory.

What the public record supports

U.S. Patent No. 386289, issued July 17, 1888.
Gong and signal chair invention category.
Washington, D.C. place anchor.

What remains open

Institutional adoption needs sources.
Biography should be expanded with public records only.

Article profile

Read the person, place, invention, and record separately.

CultureUp keeps each layer visible so a patent record does not get stretched into claims the source trail cannot support.

The patent record

Google Patents mirrors U.S. Patent No. 386289 for a gong and signal chair issued July 17, 1888.

The person in the record

The person record remains patent-first, with career and biography context reserved for sourced expansion.

Place attached to the claim

Washington, D.C. is the place frame attached to the patent record.

The invention

The invention belongs to signaling and service infrastructure.

Business, labor, and use

The patent supports inventorship, not adoption or all service-labor context.

What the record cannot prove

The patent cannot prove full biography, institutional adoption, market use, or first-language.

Patent records

Grant trail

Grant rank and unique-holder rank are shown separately so repeat patentees do not distort the chronological sequence.

Backlog priority 6Not chronological rankutility patentmedium high

386289: Gong and Signal Chair

Miriam E. Benjamin / 1888-07-17

Backlog priority row, not a chronological rank. Benjamin is explicitly included in Backlog 3 with the signal-chair patent row attached.

Residence: Washington, D.C.
Category: signal systems / service infrastructure
Source status: medium high
Backlog status: indexable_profile_candidate
Primary sources: 1 mapped

Source trail

Claims stay tied to source limits.

Patent record

Patent text, case-file context, or patent-image trails that can support inventor, title, number, date, place, and claim language.

patent text mirrorpatent text

US386289A - Gong and Signal Chair

Google Patents / 1888 patent record

Supports: Shows Miriam E. Benjamin of Washington, D.C. connected to a gong and signal chair patent issued July 17, 1888.
Limit: The patent record supports the invention row and place label. It does not prove full biography, institutional adoption, or every later signal-system use.
Last checked: 2026-06-09
Source URL: https://patents.google.com/patent/US386289A/en