McCoy, Elijah, << ih LY juh >> (1844?-1929), was an African American engineer and inventor who developed the automatic lubricator. His invention, the lubricator cup, continuously supplies lubricants to moving parts of various types of machines.
Before McCoy’s invention in the early 1870’s, workers had to lubricate the parts of machines regularly. The lubricator cup automatically oils machine parts as they operate, and has eliminated the need for such workers. Throughout his life, McCoy worked to improve lubricating systems for locomotives and other machines. The expression the real McCoy, meaning the real thing, may have originated with machinery buyers who insisted that their new equipment have only McCoy lubricators. However, there are also a number of competing explanations for the origin of this expression.
McCoy was born in Colchester, Ontario. His parents had been slaves who fled to Canada from Kentucky. McCoy was apprenticed to a mechanical engineer in Scotland and later worked as a fireman-oilman for several railroads in Michigan. He died on Oct. 10, 1929.
