George Franklin Grant

Grant was born on September 15, 1846, in Oswego, New York, to Phillis Pitt and Tudor Elandor Grant.{{cite news |title=African Americans and the Game of Golf |url=https://www.nytimes.com/books/first/s/sinnette-fairways.html |quote=He was born on September 15, 1846 in the small town of Oswego, New Dork, and he was one of seven children born to Phillis Pitt and Tudor Elandor Grant. |newspaper=New York Times |accessdate=2007-06-21 }}{{cite news |title=Son Invented Wooden Tee for Golfing |url=http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-97746691.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121105190342/http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-97746691.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=2012-11-05|quote= George Franklin Grant is the only one of Tudor E. Grant's four children who left much of a historical trail, but it's an intriguing one, notably for an invention used by millions of golfers. 'Born in 1847 in Oswego to Tudor and Phillis Pitt Grant, he was educated in Oswego but apparently left home at age 15 after an argument with his father over his taste in clothes. He went to work for an Oswego dentist named S.A. Smith, toiling in a laboratory for five years, according to a Boston Public Library document. |newspaper=The Post-Standard |accessdate=2007-06-21 }} He attended the Bordentown School in Bordentown, New Jersey.[http://blogforallensworth.blogspot.com/2010/05/place-out-of-time-bordentown-school.html "A Place Out Of Time – The Bordentown School"], Friends of Allensworth, May 18, 2010. Accessed March 7, 2023. "From 1886 to 1955, the Bordentown School was the only state-run, all-black, co-educational boarding school north of the Mason-Dixon Line.... Notable Bordentown alumni include celebrated jazz organist Rhoda Scott, and George Grant dentist, Harvard professor, and inventor of the golf tee."

He entered the Harvard Dental School (now the Harvard School of Dental Medicine) in 1868, and graduated in 1870. He then took a position in the department of mechanical dentistry in 1871, making him Harvard University's first African-American faculty member.{{cite web |title=George Franklin Grant, 1847-1910 |url=https://www.countway.harvard.edu/chm/rarebooks/exhibits/gilt/gilt4.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120213112643/https://www.countway.harvard.edu/chm/rarebooks/exhibits/gilt/gilt4.html |archive-date=2012-02-13 |accessdate=2007-05-24 |publisher=Harvard |quote=Dr. George Franklin Grant (1847-1910) of Oswego, New York, received a degree from the Harvard Dental School in 1870 and then joined the faculty as an authority on mechanical dentistry. He was the first African-American faculty member at the university and remembered today for his invention and patenting of the golf tee.}}

Grant was a founding member and later the president of the Harvard Odontological Society and was a member of the Harvard Dental Alumni Association where he was elected president in 1881. In 1899 he improved on Percy Ellis' "Perfectum" tee.Mary Bellis, [https://archive.today/20120718101105/http://inventors.about.com/od/gstartinventions/a/golf.htm "History of Golf & Golf Equipment".]{{Cite news |last=Pilkington |first=Ed |date=2025-04-18 |title=If Harvard, armor-plated by history and padded with funds, can’t beat Trump, no one can |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/18/trump-harvard-university-endowment |access-date=2025-04-20 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}

Grant died on August 21, 1910, at his vacation home in Chester, New Hampshire, of liver disease.{{cite news |url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0HFI/is_10_51/ai_65486576 |title=Birth of the tee: The story behind the man who gave the ball the perfect setup - George Franklin Grant, inventor |accessdate=2007-05-24 |quote=Grant was born in 1846 in Oswego, N.Y. Unlike many modern-day heroes, his contribution to the game was through ingenuity and resourcefulness rather than playing ability. Grant received a patent for the golf tee in 1899. His was the blueprint for today's wooden and plastic tees. He owned the first patent, but it took almost a century to receive recognition for his invention.|publisher=Bnet | author=Pete McDaniel | author-link=Pete McDaniel | year=2000}}

• {{US patent|638920}}

• William Lowell Sr., another golf tee inventor

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Category:Harvard University faculty

Category:Golf equipment manufacturers

Category:1846 births

Category:1910 deaths

Category:20th-century African-American academics

Category:20th-century American academics

Category:Bordentown School alumni

Category:Harvard School of Dental Medicine alumni

Category:19th-century African-American academics

Category:19th-century American academics

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