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Improviser’s Toolbox: paper clips

FEATURE

verything in the 21st century office

would seem alien to H. G. Wells’s

Victorian-era time traveller – except

for the paper clip. Invented in the

1870s, the loop within a loop design

of this handy little office item hasn’t

been improved since. William Middlebrook patented

the design for the machinery to create paper clips

in 1899 and sold it to Cushman & Denison. The

American office supply manufacturer registered a

trademark for the Gem name in connection with

paper clips in 1904. Paper clips are still sometimes

referred to as Gem clips, and the Swedish word for

a paper clip is gem. While Norwegian Johan Vaaler

is often credited as the inventor of the paper clip, his

design was different and never mass-produced.

Before the paper clip came along, the straight

pin was the paper fastener of choice. While it was

cheap and easy to use, it left rust stains and holes in

the paper. In the mid-1800s, the mass production of

low-cost steel that had the right balance of strength

and malleability helped dislodge the straight pin in

favour of more flexible alternatives like the looped

paper clip. There were several other clip shapes that

were developed close to the beginning of the 19th

century. The Fay clip is often credited as the earliest

patented design in 1867, followed by the Wright clip

patented in 1877, and the Niagara clip a couple of

decades later. Some of these clips used less wire,

while others could secure larger stacks of paper.

However the Gem clip won, not only because of its

elegant design, but also because its production was

easy to automate. All it took was three bends and a

snip. There were no sharp edges and the paper clip

was supple enough to snug papers between the

loops and then hold them together.

Over the years the paper clip has been twisted,

pulled apart, and used as a tool for everything

from ejecting optical drives to inserting SIM cards

and even to pick locks. Kyle MacDonald famously

traded a red one for a house. The humble paper

clip was even used as a symbol of resistance by

the Norwegians during the Second World War

against the Nazi occupation that forbade people

from wearing badges or pins depicting national

symbols. In a spiritual continuation of that tradition,

the paper clip has perhaps been immortalised as a

symbol for the digital era in the form of the universal

attachment icon.

E

Mayank Sharma

@geekybodhi

Mayank is a Padawan

maker with an

irrational fear of drills.

He likes to replicate

electronics builds

and gets a kick out

of hacking everyday

objects creatively.

Hold, build, and break out things with this inexpensive ubiquitous tool

CLIPS

PAPER