The Complete Biography of Jan Earnst Matzeliger, the African American Inventor of the Automated Shoe Lasting Machine

Ontario, Canada — Writer Peggy Plet has published the first ever biography on African American inventor Jan Earnst Matzeliger, the man who invented the automated shoe lasting machine.

In Jan Earnst Matzeliger: A Lasting Invention, the inventor’s life is placed within the context of race and class, both in his country of birth Suriname, where he was born in slavery, as well as in Lynn, Massachusetts, where he later lived and worked.

Additionally, some of the persisting myths about the inventor’s life are tackled. Matzeliger, the ultimate personification of the America dream, is one of America’s heroes. This biography reveals newly uncovered details about his personal life and challenges the existing image of the inventor.

Peggy U. Plet is a researcher and writer on Surinamese Women’s History and Slavery. For the past six years she has done extensive research on Jan E. Matzeliger, with whom she shares the same country of birth and the immigrant experience. The author has lived in the Netherlands, and is a graduate of Utrecht University. She currently lives in Canada.

Jan Earnst Matzeliger: A Lasting Invention (297 pages) is self-published and available for purchase via the author’s website at www.janmatzeliger.com and Amazon.com

Peggy U. Plet can be reached via e-mail at matzeliger@outlook.com