Norbert Rillieux
Engineer
Nineteenth-century engineer whose Multiple-Effect Evaporator invention promoted the sugar industry's growth by expediting the process of sugar refinement.
He studied engineering and physics at the Ecole Centrale in Paris, France.
He attempted to alleviate the nineteenth-century Yellow Fever epidemic in New Orleans by proposing a plan for correcting engineering deficiencies in the city's sewers.
He and his six siblings were members of a wealthy Louisiana Creole family. His mother was a liberated woman of African descent, and his father was a Louisiana plantation owner.
He was a distant relative of renowned Impressionist painter Edgar Degas.