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Sunday, 27 July 2014

Cotton Swab

Cotton swabs or Q-Tips® were invented in the 1920's by a Polish-born American named Leo Gerstenzang.

Gerstenzang got the idea after watching his wife clean their baby's ears with cotton stuck onto a toothpick.

Gerstenzang developed a machine that wound cotton uniformly around each end of a specially cured birch wood stick. The machine sterilised the swabs and then packaged them in a sliding box.

The phrase "untouched by human hands" became widely known in the production of cotton swabs.

Cotton Swabs were originally called "Baby Gays." It was changed in 1926 to Q-Tips, the "Q" standing for "quality."

The term "Q-tips" is often used as a genericized trademark for cotton swabs in the USA.

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