History Hangout: 10 historical facts about the pin and the tack

1.) There are different types of pins. The push pin, for instance, has a large plastic head on it, as pictured below. A push pin, also known as a drawing pin or thumbtack, generally has a flat or slightly curved head of brass and a small brass nail sticking out of its bottom. There are also clothing pins, drawing pins, etc.

2.) In 1900, Edwin Moore, the founder of the Moore Push-Pin Company in America, invented the map pin, a small pin with a small round head on it often made of plastic today. Map pins are pictured below.

3.) Edwin Moore also invented the push pin in 1903.

4.) Also in 1903, the thumbtack was invented by Mick Clay in England, though he would live his days in poverty having sold off his invention to another who became quite wealthy because of it.

5.) The modern safety pin, pictured below, was invented by Walter Hunt in 1849, though a more crude version of the safety pin is known to have been used throughout history going at least as far back as the 14th Century B.C. in Mediterranean Europe.

6.) The "drawing pin" is basically just another term for a push pin or brass tack or even map pin. However, the term came about because such pins were used to pin up drawing paper on drawing boards.

7.) The bobby pin, pictured below, is a close cousin to the straighter hair pin, which was quite common in the 19th Century and has a history going back nearly 2,000 years. The bobby pin itself came into fashion during the 1920s because it helped women to keep up the then trendy bob or bobby or bobbish hairstyles.

8.) The clothes pin is a later cousin to the clothes peg, which is a similar, simpler tool. The wooden clothes peg was historically invented by Jeremie Victor Qpdebec, while the modern clothes pin that includes a spring was invented in 1853 by David M. Smith. See the image below for a clothes pin, these wooden, though some do come in plastic.

9.) While traditionally clothes pins are used to hold clothes on a line, they have many other uses. For instance, they are commonly used in film photography to hand photos to dry on a line.

10.) Stamped thumbtacks are not very common today and are made from one small piece of metal in which the nail part is made from cutting and bending down a sliver of metal made from the head of the thumbtack. See the image below for an example.