1873 Levi Strauss Copper Rivet or Original Early 1910's jeans Cowboy Ranch Photo

The Unofficial Uniform of American Industry May 20, 1873 marked the birth of Levi Strauss blue jeans: what would become a staple of American industry and culture, and eventually one of the most known garments in the world’s history. Born out of necessity, they were the result of a request by a miner’s wife to her local tailor (and Strauss’ future business partner), Jacob W. Davis, for work pants that could withstand the wear and tear of her husband’s industry. Adding rivets to key stress points in that pants (the crotch and the pockets) made all the difference, and became the basis for Davis’s and Strauss’s “Patent for Improvement in Fastening Pocket Openings” from the U.S. government and eventual business venture. Known as “waist overalls” until the 1950’s, they quickly became the favored work pant of Californian and Western industries, and, by the 1920’s, the favored work pant of all American industries, due to their unparalleled durability and revolutionary design. Their bigges