Patents Galore

Before the end of the 19th century there were nearly 1000 patents for folding boxes and the machines that made them.  America had machines for making folding cardboard boxes, and in 1898 Wills' Three Castle cigarettes were packaged by machine-made cartons in Philadelphia.  Folding cartons were the new way to package. 

By the 1920s cartons packaged candies, candy, cereal, cookies, and almost every other machine-made product.  The National Biscuit Company came to Robert Gair's son (whose father invented the machine to manufacture folding boxes) about a new nationally advertised product.  He suggested they have a name for their product and Uneeda Biscuits was born and the "cracker barrel" was history.

American packaging showcased new and ingenious designs.  Until 1841 collapsible packaging had been made from animal bladders.  An American artist patented a collapsible metal tube for colors.  In 1870 the first tube making machine was invented.  By 1892 a Connecticut dentist was making toothpaste tubes and Colgate pioneered large sale marketing of toothpaste as we know it.

In 1912, Mennen lead off with shaving cream tubes which foresaw the end of the shaving mug.  Men's faces began to be clean shaven with the exception of the occasional mustache.  The very first Mennen shaving cream tube advertisement showed a clean shaven chin.

Next time...Packaging gets pretty
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Today in Pioneer History: "On February 27, 1827, a group of masked and costumed students dance through the streets of New Orleans, Louisiana, marking the beginning of the city's famous Mardi Gras celebrations.  The celebration of Carnival, or the weeks between Twelfth Night on January 4 and Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the Christian period of Lent, spread from Rome throughout Europe to America.