We can make phone calls via the internet due to the work of a black female inventor.  It is an African American female inventor who holds the patent for the CCTV.  The reason we can afford numerous pairs of shoes in our lifetime is due to a black inventor from Suriname. Automatic elevator doors were invented by an African American entrepreneur. 


We enjoy vanilla perfume (including Chanel), cola drinks and vanilla cake thanks to the invention of a unique pollination technique for the vanilla pod in the 1830’s. The inventor was 12 at the time – an orphaned African child slave from an island in the Indian Ocean.

He never received any credit or compensation for making many, many people and countries rich. 


In 2019 a black South African doctor and inventor performed the first 3D ear transplant. 

A seTswana entrepreneur invented the Pelebox, a revolutionary way for rural people to access their medication, thereby alleviating long hours in queues for sickly patients. 

Fact. Many black people don’t know that black people are inventors and many white people don’t believe that black people are inventors, let alone the originators of so many life-changing developments.

We Were Always Here hopes to change these misconceptions by showing future generations of black inventors, entrepreneurs, business leaders and pioneers that they too can shape the world. 


The second part of the book focuses on the Golden Era (1870 – 1945) where the fastest economic growth period in recorded history took place in the United States of America.

African American inventors helped fuel this. 

Indeed, while people believe it was the white man who did the inventing, this is not true. 

Unfortunately, ‘history’ is dictated by the ruling elite, and therefore the role of the African American inventor has been largely unaccounted for until now. 

According to research by the Brookings Institute: “Simply put, during this period, northern black people were among the most inventive people in world history.”