The broader movement to tell more complete histories of American invention has made her more visible than she was during most of her lifetime.

This growing recognition is important and necessary.

It is also incomplete.

A name appearing on a list, or being included in a book that most people don’t read, or being the subject of a documentary that reaches a limited audience, is not the same as being genuinely integrated into the historical consciousness of the society whose achievements one contributed to.

Mary Kenner is better known now than she was twenty years ago, but she is still not as well known as she deserves to be.