Keeping it all together-Staplers

People have long needed a way to fasten pieces of paper together. The first system was to tie them together with string or ribbon. Much later, the stapler was introduced to permanently hold paper together; the metal staple is punched through the paper and is then turned inward by the stapler's base, or anvil, sealing the staple shut.

Samuel Slocum, an American, received the first patent for a stapler in 1841. The modern stapler appeared in the 1890s.