Biography james e west

American inventor and acoustician (born )

James Edward Maceo West (born February 10, ) is an American inventor and acoustician.

How old is james west

He holds over foreign and U.S. patents for the production and design of microphones and techniques for creating polymer foil electrets.

Early life

West was born on February 10, , in Farmville, Prince Edward County, Virginia as the elder of two children to Samuel Edward and Matilda West. He was born in his maternal grandfather's house because the local hospital would not admit Black people.

His father worked at various points as a funeral home owner, an insurance salesman, and as a Pullman porter on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. His mother was a schoolteacher who worked at Langley Air Force Base during World War II; she later lost her job due to her involvement in the NAACP and became one of the "Hidden Figures" (Black astrophysicists who worked for NASA at Langley Research Center and received little to no credit for the