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20 gadgets that changed the world

See the top inventions that changed the way we live.

15. ZIPPER In 1851 Elias Howe received a patent for an "Automatic, Continuous Clothing Closure". He did not try to seriously market it, missing recognition he might otherwise have received. Howe's device was more like an elaborate draw-string than a true slide fastener. Forty-two years later, Whitcomb Judson, who invented a pneumatic street railway, marketed a "Clasp Locker". The device served as a (more complicated) hook-and-eye shoe fastener. With the support of businessman Colonel Lewis Walker, Judson launched the Universal Fastener Company to manufacture the new device. The clasp locker had its public debut at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and met with little commercial success.[6] Judson is sometimes given credit as the inventor of the zipper, but he never made a practical device.
15. ZIPPER In 1851 Elias Howe received a patent for an "Automatic, Continuous Clothing Closure". He did not try to seriously market it, missing recognition he might otherwise have received. Howe's device was more like an elaborate draw-string than a true slide fastener. Forty-two years later, Whitcomb Judson, who invented a pneumatic street railway, marketed a "Clasp Locker". The device served as a (more complicated) hook-and-eye shoe fastener. With the support of businessman Colonel Lewis Walker, Judson launched the Universal Fastener Company to manufacture the new device. The clasp locker had its public debut at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and met with little commercial success.[6] Judson is sometimes given credit as the inventor of the zipper, but he never made a practical device.

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