First Versions: March 2015

Colgate (toothpaste)

Colgate logo

Names:
--- "Colgate's Antiseptic Dental Powder" (glass jar)
--- "Colgate's Ribbon Dental Cream" (collapsible tube)

Category: Health - Beauty

Subcategory: Toothpaste

Inventor - Producer: Colgate & Company under the management of Samuel Colgate (founded by his father William Colgate in 1806)

Production start: 1873 (in jar, 1896 in collapsible tube) - New York City, USA

Features: The label of the "Colgate's Antiseptic Dental Powder" in jar reads: "To cleanse and whiten the teeth. This powder contains precipitated carbonate of calcium, carbonate of magnesium, and soap. Endorsed by professors of chemistry in dental schools and recommended by leading dentists".

Interesting facts: In 1806, William Colgate starts a starch, soap and candle business on Dutch Street in New York City. In 1857, upon his death, the company is reorganized as Colgate & Co. under the management of Samuel Colgate, his son.

Slogan (1908): «We couldn't improve the product so we improved the tube».

Property: Colgate-Palmolive Company

Producer website: http://www.colgatepalmolive.com

Colgate's Antiseptic Dental Powder package

Colgate's Antiseptic Dental Powder (1873)

Colgate Dental Powder advertisement 1891

Colgate's Dental Powder, newspaper advertisement (The Indianapolis journal, Oct. 18, 1891)

Colgate's Dental Powder in a sample box (1897)

Colgate's Antiseptic Powders advertisement 1905

Colgate's Antiseptic Powders advertisement (Country Life in America magazine, February 1905)

Colgate's Antiseptic Dental Powder advertisement 1906 - Colgate's 100th anniversary

Colgate's Antiseptic Dental Powder advertisement: a special package marks Colgate company's 100th anniversary (The Delineator magazine, September 1906)

Colgate's Ribbon Dental Cream (1896). In 1892, Doctor Washington Sheffield, an American Dentist of New London manufactured toothpaste into a collapsible tube (right image below). He had the idea after his son travelled to Paris and saw painters using paint from tubes. Colgate's Ribbon Dental Cream was packaged in collapsible tubes imitating Sheffield. The original collapsible toothpaste tubes were made of lead.

Colgate Dental Cream and Sheffiled's Dentifrice

Colgate's Ribbon Dental Cream advertisement (The Ladies' Home Journal, Feb. 1910)

Colgate's Ribbon Dental Cream advertisement (McCall's Magazine, Dec. 1911)

Colgate's Ribbon Dental Cream advertising card (1915)

The inventors of the Colgate toothpaste.

From left: William Colgate (Hollingbourne, Jan. 25, 1783 - New York City, Mar. 25, 1857), who founded in 1806 what became the Colgate toothpaste company, and his son Samuel Colgate (New York City, Mar. 22, 1822 - Orange, Apr. 23, 1897), manager of the Colgate & Co. during the years of product launch.

Colgate toothpaste, an advanced version

Nutella

Nutella logo 1964
by "Studio Stile" Milan

Name: "Nutella"

Category: Food

Subcategory: Spread

Inventors: Pietro Ferrero (1946 "Giandujot") and his son Michele Ferrero (1964 "Nutella")

Producer: Ferrero S.p.A. (founder: Pietro Ferrero)

Production start: April 20, 1964 - Alba, Cuneo, Piedmont, Italy

First price: Glass 110 g / 110 ITL - 160 g / 160 ITL

Ingredients: Sugar, palm oil, hazelnut, cocoa, skimmed milk, whey (milk), lecithin as emulsifier (soy), vanillin (artificial flavor).

Interesting facts: Nutella, in its earliest form, was created in the 1940s by Mr. Pietro Ferrero, a pastry maker and founder of the Ferrero company. At the time, there was very little chocolate because cocoa was in short supply due to World War II rationing. So Mr. Ferrero used hazelnuts, which are plentiful in the Piedmont region of Italy (northwest), to extend the chocolate supply. The original version of Nutella spread was called "pasta gianduja", pasta which means paste, and "gianduja" which is the name of a carnival character famous to the region. In 1951 the product was altered into a paste that came in a jar, so it could be spread on the bread. This then became known as "Supercrema gianduja" because it was a spreadable version of the gianduja. "Supercrema gianduja" was renamed "Nutella" in 1964, with the origin of the word being "nut" and the "ella" giving it a soft ending.

Slogan (1964): «Una delizia da spalmare sul pane» - "A delight to spread on bread"

Property: Ferrero S.p.A.

Product website: http://www.nutella.it

The origin of Nutella: Ferrero Giandujot (1946)

Supercrema, the creamy version of Giandujot (1951)

Supercrema advertising (1950s): «Alle massaie intelligenti la Supercrema» ("To intelligent housewives Supercrema")

Supercrema advertising (1963): «La deliziosa crema spalmabile» ("The delicious creamy spreadable")

Nutella in its first version (1964)

Nutella advertising (1964): «Una delizia da spalmare sul pane» ("A delight to spread on bread")

The inventors of Nutella.

Pietro Ferrero (Farigliano, Sep. 2, 1898 - Alba, Mar. 2, 1949), the founder of Ferrero S.p.A., and his son Michele Ferrero (Dogliani, Apr. 26, 1925 - Monte Carlo, Feb. 14, 2015), who launched the Nutella brand.

Nutella celebrates 50th anniversary (2014)

Levi Strauss & Co. (blue jeans)

Levi's logo 1967
by W. Landor & Associates

Name: "Levi's 501"

Category: Fashion

Subcategory: Pants

Inventors: Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis

Producer: Levi Strauss & Co.

Patented: May 20, 1873 - San Francisco, California, USA

First price: In 1879 Levi's pants were selling for 1.46 USD

Features: The pants - called "waist overalls" - had one back pocket with the Arcuate stitching design, a watch pocket, a cinch, suspender buttons and a rivet in the crotch. The pants were made of 9 oz. XX blue denim, which comes from the Amoskeag Mill in Manchester, New Hampshire.

Interesting facts: Levi Strauss, a Bavarian-born dry goods merchant, came to San Francisco in 1853 at the age of 24 to open a West Coast branch of his brothers' New York wholesale dry goods business. One day the wife of a local laborer asked Jacob to make a pair of pants for her husband that wouldn't fall apart. Jacob tried to think of a way to strengthen his trousers and came up with the idea to put metal rivets at points of strain, like pocket corners and the base of the button fly. These riveted pants were an instant hit. Jacob quickly decided to take out a patent on the process, but needed a business partner to help get the project rolling. He immediately thought of Levi Strauss, from whom he had purchased the cloth to make his riveted pants. Davis wrote to Levi to suggest that the two men hold the patent together. Levi, being an astute businessman, saw the potential for this new product, and agreed to Jacob’s proposal. The two men received the patent on May 20, 1873.

Slogan (1887): «It's no use they can't be ripped».

Property: Levi Strauss & Co.

Producer website: https://www.levistrauss.com

The first model of Levi's jeans - Ticket

XX: the first 501 jean with its guarantee ticket (ca. 1900)

Figure from Patent granted to Jacob Davis and Levi Strauss (May 20, 1873)

Levi Strauss & Co., newspaper advertisement (The daily intelligencer, Seattle, June 4, 1880). «LEVI STRAUSS & CO.'S PATENT RIVETED CLOTHING, adapted especially for miner's wear».

Levi Strauss & Co., newspaper advertisement (Las Vegas daily gazette, July 7 1881)

Levi Strauss & Co., the "Two Horse Brand" leather tag (1887) showing a team of horses trying to pull apart a pair of pants, began to be sewn into the back of the company's "waist-high overalls", the term Levi Strauss preferred to "jeans".

Levi Strauss & Co., salesman's flyer (ca. 1900)

Levi's "Red Tab" (1936) was first placed onto the right back pocket of the overalls. The Tab was created to differentiate Levi's overalls from competitors.

The inventors of Levi's 501 jeans.

From left: Levi Strauss (Buttenheim, Feb. 26, 1829 - San Francisco, Sep. 26, 1902), businessman; Jacob W. Davis (Riga, 1831 - San Francisco, 1908), tailor, inventor, and entrepreneur.

Levi's 501, 150th Anniversary (1873-2023) products and celebrations

IBM (Personal Computer)

IBM logo 1972
by Paul Rand

Name: "IBM PC 5150"

Categories: Electronics, Home - Office - School

Subcategory: Computer

Developer: William C. Lowe

Producer: IBM Corporation (founder: Charles R. Flint)

William Cleland Lowe
Easton, Jan. 15, 1941
Lake Forest, Oct. 19, 2013,
the engineer known as
the father of the IBM PC

Production start: August 12, 1981 - Boca Raton, Florida, USA

Discontinued: April 2, 1987

First price: 1,565 USD

Features: Operating system IBM BASIC / PC DOS 1.0 - CP/M-86 - UCSD p-System. - CPU Intel 8088 @ 4.77 MHz. - Memory 16 kB ~ 256 kB. - Motherboard with five 8-bit Industry Standard Architecture slots, and two DIN connectors for keyboard and cassette interface. - Color Graphics Adapter. - Sound 1-channel PWM. - Floppy disk or cassette system.
Options included: a printer that could print in two directions at 80 characters per second in 12 different character styles, and also check itself for malfunctions and provide an out-of-paper signal; a color/graphics monitor with 16 foreground and background colors and 256 characters for text applications; one or two internal floppy drives were optional.
Application software: "VisiCalc" (Personal Software, Inc.), "General Ledger" / "Accounts Receivable" / "Accounts Payable" (Peachtree Software, Inc.), "EasyWriter" (Information Unlimited Software, Inc.), "Microsoft Adventure" (Microsoft Corporation).

Interesting facts: IBM PC 5150 was introduced only a year after corporate executives gave the go-ahead to Bill Lowe, the lab director in the company's Boca Raton, Fla., facilities. He set up a task force that developed the proposal for the first IBM PC. During a meeting with top executives in New York, Lowe claimed his group could develop a small, new computer within a year. Lowe picked a group of 12 strategists who worked around the clock to hammer out a plan for hardware, software, manufacturing setup and sales strategy. It was so well-conceived that the basic strategy remained unaltered throughout the product cycle. IBM PC 5150 was publicly announced on August 12, 1981 at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City.

Slogan: «The IBM Personal Computer and me»

Property: IBM Corporation

Producer website: http://www.ibm.com