Staplers are used in a wide variety of places including offices, business, medical fields, schools and more. There are even many different kinds of staplers. The most common one is a handy device for joining paper together, but there are also surgical staplers and other types. Staplers are so common that it’s hard to imagine a time where they haven’t existed. But when was the stapler invented?
Stapler History
Before staplers were invented, there was a great need for an efficient way to combine pages together. There were many different methods of achieving this such as gluing and sewing pages to attach them to each other. There was a great need for a better method.
The history of the stapler is a little murky. There were several inventors who came out with early versions of the stapler. George McGill invented a device in 1866 that was an early version of the modern staplers. In 1867 he received a patent for a press that inserted a fastener into paper. Around this same time, other stapler devices were also being patented. C.H. Gould received a patent in 1868 for a stapler, and Albert Kletzker also had a patent for another device.
Another inventor Henry R. Heyl filed a patent in 1877 for what many consider a modern stapler. He is often credited with being the inventor of the modern stapler, but with all the other similar inventions of the time, there is much debate on the topic.
What are Staplers Made Of?
Most commonly staplers are made from metal. Though some modern staplers are being made from plastic. Staplers have composed of four main parts:
Anvil – The anvil of a stapler is the metal part which you place over the paper you want to staple
Magazine – The magazine of a stapler is the part that holds the staplers
Head – The head of the stapler is what covers the magazine
Hanger – The hanger of a stapler is what connects the base of the stapler to the magazine
How are Staplers Made?
Staplers are typically made by taking a flat sheet of metal and punching through the sheet into the required parts. Think of it like a giant cookie cutter stamping out parts. After the parts are stamped out from the sheet of metal they are then shaped sometimes using machines and heat in order to bend the parts into alignment.
After the parts are formed, rivets are made. Rivets hold the parts of the stapler together. They are made from forging a piece of bar.
Injection molding is used to make the plastic parts of a stapler and the pin which is the hinge point of the stapler is cut from a piece of metal. At this point, the parts are painted and assembled. For a more in-depth review of how staplers are made you can read this guide.