Introduction -- Mary Dixon Kies -- Martha Hunt Coston -- Margaret Knight -- Helen Augusta Blanchard -- Josephine Cochran -- Harriet Strong -- Mary Anderson -- Beulah Louise Henry -- Edith Clarke -- Marjorie Stewart Joyner -- Mary Engle Pennington -- Katharine Blodgett -- Hedy Lamarr -- Marion Donovan -- Allene Rosalind Jeanes -- Elizabeth Lee Hazen and Rachel Fuller Brown -- Gertrude Elion -- Conclusion.

This book features all the women inducted in the first fifty years of the US National Inventors Hall of Fame. Each entry first provides a biography of the inductee and then goes on to describe one or more of their major inventions with descriptions that are accessible to those with little or no formal training in science. The evolution of the opportunities available to women in education and the professions becomes evident as the reader moves chronologically through biographies and inventions of the woman. Later inductees have received Nobel Prizes for their work and have become members of academies such as the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Sciences, and the National Academy of Medicine. Others have received the National Medal of Science or the National Medal of Technology and Innovation. As an important part of the Women in Science and Engineering book series, the work highlights the contributions of women inventors, inspiring women and men, and girls and boys, in a variety of scientific fields.