What a cool thing the zipper is and we totally ignore it. Screw button fly; I want a zipper! What would the world be like without the zipper? Buttons; that's what it would be and what a drag that would be. Elias Howe, the inventor of the sewing machine, first thought up the zipper concept in 1851 but the sewing machine was his main preoccupation and he sort of let it go. A man named Gideon Sundbach designed the modern zipper. It wasn't until 1923 the B.F. Goodrich company the rubber company added the fastener to pairs of rubber galoshes and coined the term zipper that the modern zipper came to be. Zippers were mainly used in boots and tobacco bags. It took almost ten years for zippers to appear in clothing. They were promoted for children's clothes making them easier for kids to dress themselves. In 1937 the French fashion industry promoted and extolled the zipper for the fly in men's trousers. The zipper really took off and became a fashion staple replacing buttons in most garments. The zipper now can be found everywhere from sleeping bags to clothing to luggage.
Lily Tomlin has said "It's to bad we have the garment industry to thank for the zipper concept when it would come in so handy for childbirth".
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