How Peace Will Only Come After Zippers
Some would say that the greatest obligation we as humans have is to repair the brokenness of the world. We strive for this lofty ideal, but we’re just people, after all, with brokenness and faults of our own. If we can’t do it, though, someone must. And that, my friends, is where the zipper enters the picture.
In 1917, a Swedish-American named Gideon Sundback acquired a patent for his “separable fastener” which was, at the time, primarily used for shoes and tobacco pouches. All was well and merry until 1923, when B.D. Goodrich Company rumpled up society and hurled it into a maelstrom of festivities; B.D. Goodrich was thoroughly irked by the drabness of the name “separable fastener” you see, and substituted it with the name “zipper.” This name was based off of the cheery “zipppppp” song of the separable fastener being fastened (or unfastened). The entire human population rejoiced, and the zipper, both literally and figuratively, repaired the brokenness of the world, at least for a bit.
During World War I, members of the U.S. Navy had, for some reason or another, the same number of pockets as I have teeth (none, that is to say). The Hookless Fastener Company examined this issue like the good little capitalists they were and, in 1917, used the hookless faster, or zipper, as we like to call it, to create a money belt.
American naval soldiers went absolutely bonkers over them, and, accordingly, almost all of the Hookless Fastener Company’s 24,000 sales in 1917 were money belts. The Navy, fascinated by the funny-sounding button-less together-maker, ordered zippers for 10,000 flying suits in 1918.
Interestingly, it actually took a bit of time for the zipper to catch on; frownies from around the world labeled zippers as “morally corrupt” for the reason that they made it too easy to remove one’s pants. Zippery zippers and ignoring the critics, though, zippers are prophets from another spiritual level who will lead us to a world of peace and tranquility.
It is a fact thoroughly forgotten, (if ever mentioned before), that a significant cause of what is known as the “Roaring Twenties” or the “Jazz Age” of America and the “Golden Twenties” of Europe was not the end of the first World War or the end of the Spanish Flu. Rather, this vibrant era of Western culture was brought about by the ecstasy that was kindled in people by their zippers. “Unfortunately, I was not alive in the 1920’s,” said an anonymous source. “I can imagine how inspired I would have been, though.”
By the 1970’s, annual zipper production was upwards of 2 billion, and the leading manufacturer, at the time, was the Japanese company YKK (Yoshida Kogyo Kabushikikaisha). Todayadays, Americans use approximately 4.5 zippers every year. Zippers both literally and figuratively unite disparate and otherwise disconnected entities; whether asking a stranger to zip up your coat after mittening up your fingers (and therefore connecting with said stranger), or clamping two flaps of a backpack together (and therefore connecting two sides of a backpack), zippers do what we humans only wish we could do.
Interestingly, spacesuits, scuba suits, and hazmat suits use airtight zippers; Neal Armstrong wore a thoroughly zippery astronaut outfit on the moon! Zippers, therefore, do not just connect humans and societies and cultures, but planets and planets as well. The Qiaotou region of China produces more zippers than any other place in the world. Therefore, if we in the United States are wearing zippers, we are unconsciously forging a bridge between us and individuals halfway around the world.
Through connection, zippers are mending the shattered qualities of human society. Buttons are friendly and velcro is pleasantly mediocre, but zippers are the most crucial invention in the past few centuries due to their pacifistic and altruistic motives. If you believe in goodness and human morality, make certain to reserve time throughout your day to express admiration to your zippers (twice an hour will suffice).
