Ten things you never knew about… zips

1. He called it a “clasp locker or unlocker for shoes”.

2. The word zipper was first used in the early 1920s and was registered as a trademark for boots made of rubber and fabric.

3. The abbreviation zip was also first recorded in 1925.

4. The word zip originally referred to the sharp sound of a fast-moving object such as a mosquito (first recorded in 1875) or a bullet (1885).

5. The term zip-fastener was first seen in 1927 in the Daily Express.

6. Worldwide, the zip industry is estimated to be worth almost £10billion a year.

7. Well over half the world’s zips are now made in Japan or China.

8. Before Judson’s zip, Elias Howe in 1851 received a patent for his Automatic, Continuous Clothing Closure type of fastener. Howe is best known for inventing an early sewing machine.

9. Truly modern zips were developed inn 1913 by the Swedish-American engineer Gideon Sundback.

10. ZIP Codes were introduced in the US in 1963. The ZIP stands for Zone Improvement Plan.