What do bulletproof vests, fire escapes, windshield wipers, and laser printers have in common?

They were all invented by women!


After a little bit of searching I found this:
"The Fire Escape: On May 7, 1878, the fire escape ladder was patented by Joseph Winters. This was followed by the portable fire escape ladder, which was invented on November 11, 1890, by Daniel McCree of Chicago."

The inventor of the window wipers was a woman.
Prior to the manufacture of Henry Ford's Model A, Mary Anderson was granted her first patent for a window cleaning device in November 1903. Her invention could clean snow, rain, or sleet from a windshield by using a handle inside the car. Her goal was to improve driver vision during stormy weather.

"The first bullet proof vest was invented by Norval V Cobb, but a woman, Stephanie Louise Kwolek's research with high performance chemical compounds for the DuPont Company led to the development of a synthetic material called Kevlar which is five times stronger than the same weight of steel. Kevlar, patented by Kwolek in 1966, does not rust nor corrode and is extremely lightweight. Many police officers owe their lives to Stephanie Kwolek, for Kevlar is the material used in bullet proof vests."
So I don't know, if technically, a women invented the bullet proof vest?

About the laser printer - I have found the following which states a man as the inventor not a woman: "All of us who use laser printers today can thank the original laser printer, developed at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center. That's where an engineer named Gary Starkweather figured out how to take Xerox copier technology and add a laser beam to it to come up with something totally new."

At https://77facts.com/bulletproof-vests-fire-escapes-windshield-wipers-and-laser-printers-were-invented-by-women/ there's a claim that all these things, and also the fire escape, were invented by women.

However, the New Shell Book of Firsts says that the inventor of the (hand-operated) windshield wiper was Prince William of Prussia in 1911 and that the bullet-proof vest was invented by a Herr Dowe in 1894. The first laser printer is said to have been the IBM 3800, produced in 1975, but no details of the inventor are given.

I suspect that the 'invented by women' answer is the one that's being looked {for;} whether it's correct seems to be open to question.

There is an ideal book to have laying around on the coffee table for the girls to rub it in called 'Girls Think of Everything: Stories of Ingenious Inventions by Women' written by Catherine Thimmesh

Technically the Laser Printer is credited to Gary Starkweather from Xerox PARC where in 1971 he invented and produced the first Laser Printer... The Laser Printer was built on technology originally developed by Chester Carlson of Xerox (the copier).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_printers

Actually a man invented the first run at the bullet proof vest:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4625858

Women invented the following, for starters: Bullet Proof vest, fire escape {Anna Connelly built the fire escape stairs in 1887}, windshield wipers [Mary Anderson], dishwasher, home security system [burglar alarm - marie system].

For a ...longer list, see http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0768070.html

The windshield wipers thing is preposterous as Mary Anderson is well-accreddited for creating the prototype. Okay, let me clarify because this is very important to me:

Women invented the following, for starters: Bullet Proof vest, fire escape {Anna Connelly built the fire escape stairs in 1887}, windshield wipers [Mary Anderson], dishwasher, home security system [burglar alarm - marie system]. So yes, the LADDER was invented by him, but she was first to build the stairs (and prototype).

I have to look up about the laser printer ...
http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blanderson.htm

There's information about the windshield wipers ....
Information about the fire escape is here:
http://www.answers.com/topic/188

"The first bullet proof vest was invented by Norval V Cobb, but a woman, Stephanie Louise Kwolek's research with high performance chemical compounds for the DuPont Company led to the development of a synthetic material called Kevlar which is five times stronger than the same weight of steel. Kevlar, patented by Kwolek in 1966, does not rust nor corrode and is extremely lightweight. Many police officers owe their lives to Stephanie Kwolek, for Kevlar is the material used in bullet proof vests."

http://www.swangames.com/discuss/forum/showmsg.php?ac=5f86009699989bfd771775bb9e6d4f0be46f7c9&msgid=1246387

Marie BROWN I mean:

inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blhomesecurity.htm