However, she continued to participate in the final manufacture of Liquid Paper. And she did it all during a time when women were discouraged from pursuing business ventures. When they took a pass, she decided to market it herself. She has a sister named Yvonne as well. They divorced in 1946. Please try again"; While Bette Nesmith Graham did not win any awards, but she sure was one of the most successful female entrepreneurs of her era. Why? Unsubscribe whenever. She whipped up a white-colored liquid in her kitchen blender, poured it into an empty nail polish bottle, and started covertly using it at work to cover up typos on documents. She is famous because she invented liquid paper. By 1975, Liquid Paper was producing 25 million bottles a year and holding a vast share of a multimillion-dollar market that had spawned several competitors, like Wite-Out. The plant, as Graham would put it, is still going strong. This cookie is set by OptinMonster. error.innerHTML = error_message; To learn more about the different cookies we're using, check out our. Graham knew that to expand her reach, shed need to improve the quality and consistency of her product. That rankled her to no end, Nesmith said to me over the phone. return b ? They would have one son in December 1942, Robert Michael Nesmith. At 17, she dropped out of high school, married a soldier named Warren Nesmith, and had a baby boy. Unsubscribe whenever. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. Raised a Baptist, Graham converted to Christian Science in 1942, and this faith inspired the development of her corporate "Statement of Policy". This cookie is set by Sailthru totracks the number of page views for each user. This cookie is set by Facebook to display advertisements when either on Facebook or on a digital platform powered by Facebook advertising, after visiting the website.
This cookie, set by Cloudflare, is used to support Cloudflare Bot Management. Bette Nesmith Graham used it to fix her typos covertly.Her creation of liquid paper in 1951 created history. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/liquid-paper-bette-nesmith-graham-1992092. By 1967, Liquid Paper had grown into a million-dollar business. She was a bad typist to boot. Bette Nesmith Graham is best known as Entrepreneur who has born on March 23, 1924 in Dallas, TX. Prior to being bought by Gillette in 1979 for $48.5 million (roughly $190 million in 2020), LPC exported their products to 31 countries and employed some 300 people, according to their internal newsletter. The test_cookie is set by doubleclick.net and is used to determine if the user's browser supports cookies. At 19 years of age, she got married to Warren Nesmith. This cookie is set by Sailthru. Long before the delete key, typing and correspondence was a vital portion of the work, first with mechanical typewriters and then electronic ones. With him, she had a son Michael Nesmith.Michael Nesmith is a musician and producer in his own right. That year she applied for a patent and changed the name to the Liquid Paper Company. setHiddenFieldValue(wrappingDiv, sp, 'funnel-medium', 'utm_medium', 'funnel_medium', 'home-exit-popup'); Holds current session data. She attracted significant clients such as General Electric and IBM and continued to expand her business rapidly. subForm.appendChild(captchaVersion); Long before the delete key, typing and correspondence was a vital portion of the work, first with mechanical typewriters and then electronic ones. Used to detect whether a user is logged into Twitter. Kidadl is independent and to make our service free to you the reader we are supported by advertising. } By joining Kidadl you agree to Kidadls Terms of Use and Privacy Policy and consent to receiving marketing communications from Kidadl. On a warm Texas night in 1956, Bette Nesmith later known as Bette Nesmith Graham sat in a garage surrounded by buckets of white tempera paint, empty nail polish bottles, and handmade labels. creative tips and more. She called her product Mistake Out.. She was a tool-maker and highly motivated to help working women, said Michael Nesmith, her son. And so women have to just keep on with their determination and be relentless. Used To facilitate data center selection. Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics: Includes Elizabeth Lucas Pinckney (indigo plant dye), Martha Coston (signal flares), Fannie Farmer (standardized recipes), Madam C. J. Walker (hair-care products), S. Josephine Baker (child hygiene), Barbara McClintock (genetics), Bette Nesmith Graham (Liquid Paper), Grace Hopper (computer-programming language), Ruth Handler (the Barbie doll), and . We recognise that not all activities and ideas are appropriate and suitable for all children and families or in all circumstances. Bette Nesmith Graham (March 23, 1924May 12, 1980) was the inventor and businesswoman who made a fortune from her invention "Liquid Paper," a product which along with its competitors such as Wite-Out, allowed secretaries to quickly correct typing mistakes. They include The Gihon Foundation, womens scholarships, and counseling. Bette also established an onsite child care center for working parents, meant to help LPC employees but open to any working parent who wanted to enroll their child. Linkedin sets this cookie. The quartet hardly gets enough credit as an actual band. American typist and inventor of Liquid Paper (19241980), "From The Folks Who Gave You Liquid Paper", "Graham, Bette Clair McMurray (19241980)", "Overlooked No More: Bette Nesmith Graham, Who Invented Liquid Paper", Bette Nesmith Graham, Liquid Paper Inventor, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bette_Nesmith_Graham&oldid=1129392668, Short description is different from Wikidata, Pages using infobox person with multiple spouses, Pages using infobox person with multiple parents, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 25 December 2022, at 03:03. Graham was also an artist who observed that painters covered up mistakes not by erasing their work, but by painting over them. Weve got you covered: Have an idea of someone we should cover? In November, a verified but fake Eli Lilly and Co. account announced that the drugmakers insulin was free. Does the Mentos and Soda Trick Work With Regular Coke? A single inspiration led Graham to invent the typing correction fluid she came to call Liquid Paper. Nesmith also auditioned and was considered too tall. The typos piled up, and when she tried to use an eraser, carbon ink would smear all over the page. She also believed that women could bring a more nurturing and humanistic quality to the male world of business, and provided a greenbelt with a fish pond, an employee library, and a childcare center in her new company headquarters in 1975. and received a large order from General Electric. She married Warren Nesmith in 1941. Just 6 months later, at the age of 56, she suffered a stroke and died. She left her fortune to her son, who took over her foundations that empower striving women. It contains the session ID for a unique session on the site. Michael Nesmith missed three shoots due to a tonsillectomy, the birth of his son Jonathan and a family trip to Texas. Business and tech news in 5 minutes or less. We try our very best, but cannot guarantee perfection. function getCookie(name) { var captchaVersion = document.createElement('input'); The transatlantic foursome ofMicky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith, Peter Tork and Davy Jones wrote and recorded a surprising range of music, from beat pop to country and psychedelic. So, in 1979, the inventor of Liquid Paper sold the company to Gillette for $47.5 million, plus a deal for royalties. var sp = new URLSearchParams(window.location.search); Born on March 23, 1924 Died on May 12, 1980 Born in Corpus Christi, Texas Worked as a secretary at a bank. The musical television series, which would premiere later that year, offered cutting-edge comedy and brilliant pop music. 1924. Do Not Sell My Information - CA Residents. Nicholson purportedly hammered out the screenplay on acid. Graham spent heavily on advertising, showcasing her product during prime-time TV programs like The Tonight Show and in Glamour and Fortune magazine spreads. Bette Graham was now wealthy, with fabulous jewelry and a Rolls-Royce. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that in 2018, secretaries and administrative professionals account for some 2 million jobs and 94% of those jobs are held by women. After a while, Bette opted to part ways with her husband after the end of WWII. in the late 1970s with a racially integrated staff. She was a tool-maker and highly motivated to help working women, said. Although some stories say she was fired from the bank for signing her name with the "Mistake Out Company," her own Gihon Foundation biography reports she simply started working part-time then left as the company succeeded. Graham later brought it to market and was soon leading an international business, based in Dallas, that produced 25 million bottles of Liquid Paper a year at its peak, with factories in Toronto and Brussels. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. Bette steadfastly maintained a 49% stake in the company, even as the company grew. Today is, , commemorating the important work of executive assistants and office professionals, the tireless people who make sure the organizational trains run on time. She was a difficult student in school as her stubborn personality led her to clash often with her teachers. if (false) { Then, just a few months later, Bette Nesmith Graham suffered a stroke and died at 59 years old. By 1951, she had risen to the post of becoming an executive secretary, the top position available to ladies in the company at the time.After reworking and improving her invention, Bette Nesmith Graham invented liquid paper in December of 1951.Graham kept her white correction paint hidden for five years, improving it with the help of her son's chemistry instructor at Dallas' Thomas Jefferson High School.She started marketing her correction solution for the typewriter, Mistake Out, in the year 1956.She started the Liquid Paper Company in 1958. She would often burst into tears of panic, Michael Nesmith wrote in his autobiography, Infinite Tuesday: An Autobiographical Riff (2017). She applied that high standard to building an inclusive organization and taking care of and supporting employees, too. Mistake Out became Liquid Paper. All of this growth happened without any outside investment. This does not influence our choices. Try to name all the famous people on magazine covers in 1979. As her health began to fail, Graham sold Liquid Paper to the Gillette Company, known mostly for selling razors, in September 1979 for $47.5 million (or more than $201 million in modern dollars). Bette Graham, inventor, entrepreneur, and philanthropist, was born in San Antonio, Texas, in 1924.
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She was a typist, and artist, a secretary, a mother, and inventor of liquid paper. Bette Nesmith Graham is no longer in the world, and hence her annual income can not be ascertained. Scroll below and check more details information about Current Net worth as well as Monthly/Year Salary, Expense, Income Reports! var v3RecaptchaResponseEl = document.getElementById('recaptcha-response-v3'); That secretary was Elizabeth Clair McMurray Nesmith Graham, the inventor of Liquid Paper and founder and CEO of the Liquid Paper Corporation. className, I wanted the product to be absolutely perfect before I distributed it, and it seemed to take so long for that to happen.. Kidadl cannot accept liability for the execution of these ideas, and parental supervision is advised at all times, as safety is paramount. Despite her best efforts to keep the concoction a secret, word soon got out and fellow secretaries wanted in on the action. With Overlooked, were adding the stories of remarkable people whose deaths went unreported in The Times. Our lab is working on a faster drying solution, Graham wrote to one customer (the lab being her kitchen and her blender). Subscribe for virtual tools, STEM-inspired play, creative tips and more. She found employment in 1951 as an executive secretary for the Texas Bank & Trust in Dallas. In 1979, Bette Graham sold the company for $47.5 million dollars and royalties on every bottle until the year 2000. Set when a user first lands on a page. var newVal = searchParams.get(utmName) || getCookieValue(cookieName); I often wonder what Bette would make of todays corporations, particularly in this time of a global pandemic. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. It was then that she opted to sell and make several bottles and in the process, she made tons of money. It is a tool, she said. This is what gave her a chance to be appointed at the Texas Bank and Trust as an executive secretary in 1951. As a. Used to monitor the technical information and use of devices that connect to our website to protect it from malicious traffic. For Graham, the parting was a blessing in disguise. But correction fluid is also being used in a wide variety of emergency and temporary fixes for white clothing and nicks in white walls or appliances or floor tiles or French manicures. Nesmith went off to World War II and while he was away, she had their only son, Michael Nesmith (later of The Monkees fame). In 1975 they went through an acrimonious divorce. The secretary that invented this product was, by many accounts, a bad typist but an extraordinary entrepreneur. She could see women who were at the highest places as executive assistants, but they didnt have decision making power. if (form.find('.email-form-submit-message').length < 1) { By 1964, the production of Liquid Paper grew 10x, to 5k bottles/week; in 1967, the company notched its first $1m in sales (~$8m today). Bellis, Mary. The product took a few different forms, but was some variation of small bottle or pen with the signature correction fluid. It appears to be a variation of the _gat cookie which is used to limit the amount of data recorded by Google on high traffic volume websites. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. You keep doing it over and over.. Bette Nesmith Graham was an American typist, commercial artist, businesswoman, and inventor of liquid paper, a correction fluid.Bette Nesmith Graham was born to Jesse McMurray and Christine Duval in Dallas, Texas, on March 23, 1924. . However, as an article from a July 1967 issue of Teen Life magazine told it, "When Davy applied for an immigration visa to America, he had to sign a form stating that he knew that after six months here, he would be eligible for the draft." Used to store information about the time a sync took place with the lms_analytics cookie. Since 1851, obituaries in The New York Times have been dominated by white men. The quick-thinking Graham mimicked their technique by using a white, water-based tempera paint to cover her typing errors. LPCs sales zenith was an increase by 137% in 1967. She turned her whiteout, Liquid Paper, into an. hp_ts += 1; Mary Bellis covered inventions and inventors for ThoughtCo for 18 years. Bellis, Mary. } After her death, a share of her fortune went to the Gihon Foundation, which she founded in 1978 and is dedicated to researching global issues, and the Betty Clair McMurray Foundation, which supports women's projects. Don't worry, the other two had good excuses. She also liked spending some time with her son. Her invention continues to be used everyday by secretaries and other people in the office and wherever typewriters are used. We will always aim to give you accurate information at the date of publication - however, information does change, so its important you do your own research, double-check and make the decision that is right for your family. Which seems odd, seeing how he was a native of England. Identifies unique web browsers visiting Microsoft sites. Facebook. Bette Nesmith Graham was an exceptional inventor. Pick: Do you consider these musicians one-hit wonders? Colorados One sports drink is so in demand that teens are charging each other to pose with empty bottles. Dolenz owned one of the first 20 Moogs ever sold (along with the Universities of Wisconsin and North Carolina). Old Bette . Graham wasnt a chemist or an engineer. We're committed to your privacy. When Nesmith went off to fight in World War II, Bette was pregnant with a boy. Her first employees were her teenage son and his friends. She opted to sell the company to Gillette Corporation for over $47.5 million in 1979. Most men are ignorant they dont really understand, she said in an interview with the Business Archives Project in 1977. $('.email-submission:not(.prevent-default)').submit(function (e) { This cookie is set by CHEQ AI Technologies.