Things did not zip seamlessly into place for the inventors of the Zipper. False starts exposed many holes in the original design before it all came together as a Design and Business Classic

Few products have gone through more iterations than the zipper, which took nearly 30 years to catch on. First patented in 1893 by Chicago engineer Whitcomb Judson, the sliding clasp was meant to be a godsend for high-button shoe wearers, doing away with the need to hook 20 or so tiny buttons. Though touted as a breakthrough at the 1893 World's Fair, the complicated mechanism worked better in theory than in reality..

Undeterred, in 1904 Judson unveiled an improved model, the C-Curity. "A pull and it's done. No more open skirts," the ad promised. Not so. C-Curity tended to pop open and lock shut, sometimes requiring the wearer to be cut out of the garment.

Convinced the concept was still sound, Judson's backers put engineer Gideon Sundback to work on the problem and introduced the Plako as "the C-Curity fastener made perfect" in 1913. It wasn't.

By then, the firm had downsized to two people Sundback and a helper. To pay bills, Sundback took on the repair of a printing machine. Something about the way the paper wound around the printing cylinders inspired him to invent an automatic paper clip machine and to see the fatal flaw in earlier fastener designs. Instead of trying to imitate a hook-and-eye, Sundback created a chain of interlocking teeth forced open and closed by a slider. It worked!

With the outbreak of World War I, the U.S. air corps bought a quantity to make a wind-tight closure for its flying suits. Otherwise, the product attracted little interest until the 1920s, when B.F. Goodrich Co. embraced it as the main feature for its new rubber galoshes. Proposed ads proclaimed: "The Mystik Boot with the patented Hookless Fastener. Opens with a pull. Closes with a pull." Goodrich salesmen loved the product but hated the name Mystik. Too fanciful and impractical, they complained. They wanted something that sounded fast, like a bullet whizzing through the air. Goodrich's president agreed, "What we need is an action word something that will dramatize the way the thing zips." Reflecting further, he exclaimed, "Why not call it the Zipper!" The Zipper was an instant hit..

Although thrilled by the orders, Hookless Fastener was chagrined that Goodrich owned the name that had become the generic for its product. It considered renaming its fasteners Utilok or Bobolink and finally trademarked Talon, descriptive of an eagle's sharp claws and sure grip. Today Talon remains a respected brand in the industry, but Zipper is the name that has truly stuck with consumers.