History of Zipper

Elias Howe, an entrepreneur and an inventor born in Massachusetts, United States in July 1819, was the person who first designed and established the foundations of the zipper. Elias Howe usually focused on sewing machines and sewing needles. He engaged in patent and intellectual property rights wars against his merciless opponents, Walter Hunt and Isaac Singer.

Even though he decided to move to the British Isles from the continent of Americas in the 1850’s, he was forced to return to Massachusetts without any money as a result of his misfortunes. What makes him unique for us is that the model of “autolock, continuous clothing covering”, the prototype of the zipper of which he owned the intellectual property rights and was developed by him in the year of 1851 even though he couldn’t or didn’t improve it. Howe died on 3 October 1867, without reviewing the first model of the zipper of which he owned the intellectual property rights.

Whitcomb L. Judson developed a hammer working with pressure which used air for rail road works. He developed his most important invention for the zipper, the “clasp locker” as he called it. Judson continued his works and after receiving approval for his patent, travelled to Chicago to participate in a global commerce fair in the year of 1893 with a great excitement. By founding the Judson Universal Fastener corporation together with Lewis Walker who saw and got impressed by the model of Judson, they tried to improve and produce the clasp locker. In the following years, Gideon Sundback, a young Swiss machinery engineer, got employed by Gideon Universal Fastener corporation.

“Clasp locker” which was developed by Judson in two models, managed to attract the interest of Sundback who joined the staff in 1909, while corporation was active in New Jersey and he started to work on it. Sundback, marrying the daughter of the manager of the factory in 1909, became the chief designer of the corporation. In 1917, he improved the design to produce hundreds of meters of the unhooked connector the serial production of which he started in 1914. The term “Zipper” was coined by Goodrich corporation.

“The father of zipper” died in 1954, as a result of an unexpected heart attack. The legacy of rich technical data he left and his improved product became popular around the globe. Zipper became a popular product after it was used in the Second World War. French and Italian fashion corporations focused on the zipper which became a fashion trend and created their own styles and sold them with the labels “with zipper” and “without zipper”.

FİM FERMUAR

Fim Fermuar was founded. It is a major zipper manufacturer since the year of 1992 with a daily rate of 350.000 units of approximately 35 cm zippers. Most importantly, it has the capabilities to produce zipper sliders which are rarely produced in the Turkish market. During this process which started in 1992 and enters its 30th year, it has transformed into a major Turkish Industrial manufacturer which exports to all continents of the world. With the ideal of “Zippers open, close, protect”, it is a source of pride that we have our fair share for the zippers which are used in every aspect of your lives.