Whitcomb Judson

Whitcomb L. Judson (born March 7, 1846 in Chicago , Illinois , † December 7, 1909 ) was an American inventor and the inventor of the zipper .

By the end of the 19th century, he was a successful inventor with a dozen patents. By 1890 he had patented the Pneumatic Railway System . Around 1888/89 he was a traveling salesman for the Harry L. Earle Manufacturing Company . Harry Earl was also one of his first partners who brought him investors.

Judson was looking for a replacement for the long laces on boots. On August 29, 1893, he received a patent for his zipper, called "clasp-locker". Although the prototype stuck a bit, it worked. Lawyer and businessman Colonel Lewis Walker of Meadville, Pennsylvania became another partner. With him he exhibited his zipper at the world exhibition in Chicago that same year . However, it was ignored by the public and their company Universal Fastener , founded in 1894, did not succeed in marketing it. The zipper and machines were too complicated.

In 1904 Judson simplified the design, calling it C-curity fastener , which was to be marketed by the newly founded Automatic Hook and Eye Company from the following year . When that failed too, Judson gave up and Walker took over the management of the company. Walker appointed his brother-in-law (Peter Aronson) as general manager and hired the Swedish mechanical engineer Gideon Sundback , who married Elvira Aronson († 1911) (other information, according to which Gideon Sundback was Judson's son-in-law, are presumably incorrect), rose and became a senior designer new model that Plako Fastener designed. After Judson's death, the zipper slowly became a success. During the First World War, the US Army used it on a larger scale from around 1917 to manufacture weatherproof clothing for US Navy pilots.

Web links

Commons : Whitcomb Judson - collection of images, videos and audio files

personal data
SURNAME	Judson, Whitcomb
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Judson, Whitcomb L.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American inventor
DATE OF BIRTH	March 7, 1846
PLACE OF BIRTH	Chicago , Illinois
DATE OF DEATH	December 7, 1909