Norbert Rillieux was a brilliant student of thermodynamics who became famous for devising evaporators for sugar cane, revolutionizing the sugar-refining industry and easing the labor of slaves.

Born free on March 17, 1806, on a New Orleans plantation to Vincent Rillieux, a prosperous engineer and inventor of a steam-operated cotton baler, and his slave wife, Constance Vivant, Norbert was baptized at the St. Louis Cathedral in the Latin Quarter. Exceptionally privileged for a Southern negro of his day, he was educated at Catholic Schools, then at L'Ecole Centrale in Paris.

In 1830, Rillieux's skill in engineering brought him a teaching post in applied mechanics at his Paris alma mater. That same year he published his findings on the applicability of steam economy to industry, and began working on the problem of evaporating moisture from cane juice while lowering heat to produce a whiter, more refined, sugar crystal. At the same time...