When you turn on your heater to keep warm, you have a Black woman to thank.
Alice Parker is the mother of modern day home heating.
Enduring cold northeastern winters inspired her to file a patent in 1919 for the first central heating system using natural gas.
Tim Depies owns a heating and cooling company and he says all our lives would be a lot different if we were still using less modern sources of heat.
"We always laugh, they're a little bit tougher and stronger than we are, we have modern day luxuries, the source of heat is brought right to us. We don't have to worry about it, it's just brought to us by local utilities," Diepies said.
Alice Parker's invention has stood the test of time with only minor tweaks.
According to records, Parker passed away in 1920 at the young age of 25, only one year after her patent was filed.
