The Office: The Gem of the Gizmos

The paper clip was invented, perhaps as far back as the 13th century, to clip papers. Since then, it has been one of the most useful of all-purpose tools. Every office worker and housewife has taken advantage of this fact for years, but it took the Germans to make a definitive study. Alarmed at the rate at which its clips were disappearing, a Munich manufacturing firm sent spies out to trace the fate of 100,000 of them.

The findings: only one out of five was ever used to clip one piece of paper to another. Of the 80,000 others, 19,413 were used as chips in card games, 15,842 were wrapped in tissue for use as typewriter-key cleaners, 14,163 were bent into grotesque shapes during telephone conversations, 7,212 held ladies’ stockings in place, 5,434 picked particles of food from between teeth, 5,309 cleaned fingernails, 3,196 reamed out pipes, 2,431 tightened screws, and 7,000 plain disappeared.

Some of the findings might not pertain to the U.S., but Americans are equally ingenious. Men use the clips for makeshift key chains and tie clips. Frustrated executives fire them against the wall with rubber bands. Secretaries use them to keep hairdos in place or hold broken bra straps together. And, bent lengthwise, a paper clip makes a perfect hook for hanging Christmas tree balls.