Otis Boykin

Otis Boykin (born August 29, 1920, Dallas, Texas, U.S.—died March 26, 1982, Chicago, Illinois) was an African American electrical engineer and inventor whose improvements to resistors—components that resist the flow of electrical current—helped advance the function control of electronic circuits in a variety of products, including televisions and computers. One of Boykin’s resistors was used as a control unit for the first successful implantable pacemaker, a medical device that helps the heart to beat steadily.

Boykin’s father was a carpenter and later a minister, and his mother was a homemaker. Boykin attended Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. While a student there he also worked as an assistant at an aerospace laboratory. In 1941, after graduating from Fisk University, he worked for the Majestic Radio and Television Corporation in Chicago. There, he served as a laboratory assistant, eventually became a supervisor, and gained valuable experience in electronics. In 1944 he took a job as a research engineer with P.J. Nilsen Research Laboratories and in 1946 enrolled in graduate studies at the Illinois Institute of Technology. That same year, he started a company, Boykin-Fruth, Inc., with former mentor and fellow engineer Hal F. Fruth. In 1947 Boykin quit graduate studies and pursued a career in electrical engineering. He eventually became an independent consultant for electronics companies in the United States and Europe.

Boykin invented about 26 electronic devices, ranging from resistors to a chemical air filter to a burglar-proof cash register, and received 11 patents. He received his first patent in 1959 for a wire precision resistor through which a specific resistance value could be assigned to a given segment of wire in an electronic circuit. He was later awarded a second patent for a more advanced and more cost-effective version of the technology that was able to withstand exposure to high temperatures, high pressure, and rapid acceleration. Versions of his resistors were used in radios, televisions, computers, and guided missiles. One of Boykin’s resistors also made it possible for the pacemaker to regulate a heartbeat with the necessary precision; pacemakers have saved and lengthened the lives of many people worldwide. Boykin was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2014.