One of the most
important moments in the Levi & Strauss
Company history is clearly the day that
their profile was added to the
Apparel Search
website. However, they have also had
many other very significant events and
achievements.
HISTORY OF THE LEVI'S®
501®
JEANS
1853 Levi Strauss
arrives in San Francisco and opens a
wholesale dry goods business, selling
clothing, blankets, handkerchiefs, etc. to
small general stores throughout the American
West.
1872 Jacob Davis, a
Reno Nevada tailor, writes to Levi Strauss,
telling him about the process he invented to
rivet the pocket corners on men's pants to
make them stronger. He suggests the two men
take out a patent on the process together
and Levi agrees.
1873 Levi Strauss &
Jacob Davis are granted a patent on the
process of riveting pants by the U.S. Patent
and Trademark Office on May 20. It is patent
number 139,121 and this is the invention of
the blue jean.
The pants - called “waist
overalls” - have one back pocket with the
Arcuate stitching design, a watch pocket, a
cinch, suspender buttons and a rivet in the
crotch. We don't know the origin of the
Arcuate stitching design. Stories about it
representing the wingspread of a bird are
myths; the loss of our records in 1906 (see
below) makes it impossible to know why the
stitching was first used. There may have
been a tradition of pocket stitching on
men's workwear but this has not been found
in any research done so far. The cinch and
suspender buttons were standard on men's
pants. Keep in mind that we did not invent
the cut or fit of the waist overalls; what
we did was take traditional men's work pants
and rivet them, creating the new category of
workwear which we today call blue jeans. The
pants are made of 9 oz. XX blue denim, which
comes from the Amoskeag Mill in Manchester,
New Hampshire. They are sewn in San
Francisco, probably in a combination of
factory production and home sewing. Because
of the loss of historical records in the
1906 earthquake and fire we don't yet know
when the first factories were opened. It's
also possible we leased factory space in the
1870 and then opened our own factories in
the 1880s.
1886 The Two Horse
brand
leather patch is first used on the waist
overalls. Its purpose was to demonstrate the
strength of the pants and reinforce our
status as the originator of patent riveted
clothing. We knew that the patent would go
into the public domain around 1890 and
decided to reinforce our message of
originality and strength graphically. There
may also have been a tradition of some sort
of patch on men's workwear at this time, but
this has been hard to research.
c1890 The rivet patent goes into the
public domain, so that Levi Strauss & Co. is
not longer the exclusive manufacturer of
riveted clothing. Lot numbers are first
assigned to the products being manufactured.
501
is used
to designate the famous copper-riveted waist
overalls. We don't know why this number was
chosen. We also made a 201 jean, which was a
less expensive version of the pants, as well
as other products using other three-digit
numbers. Because of the loss of our records
in 1906, the reasons for many of these
changes are unknown.
c1901 The pants – now
just called “overalls” - now have two back
pockets. It's likely we added this
additional pocket due to consumer requests
or changes in men's fashions at the time.
1902 Levi Strauss
dies at the age of 73. His nephews take over
the business; their descendants still run
the company today.
1906 The San
Francisco earthquake and fire destroys the
headquarters and factories of Levi Strauss &
Co. A new factory is built at 250
Valencia Street in San Francisco and opens
in November.
1910s Sometime during
this decade the jeans are sewn with a felled
inseam. Prior to this time the inseam was
“mock” felled.
1915 The overalls win
a “Highest Award” at the Panama-Pacific
International Exposition in San Francisco.
LS&CO. begins to buy denim from Cone Mills
in Greebsboro, North Carolina.
1922 Belt loops are
added to the overalls, but the suspender
buttons are still retained. The cinch is
also still used on the pants, but some men
cut if off in order to wear
the overalls with a belt. Again, the
addition of belt loops was in response to
changes in men's fashions and our
understanding of what consumers wanted.
LS&CO. now buys its denim exclusively from
Cone Mills.
c1927 Cone Mills
develops the 10 oz. red selvage denim
exclusively for the 501® jeans. The denim is
woven in 29” wide looms.
1936 The red Tab is
first placed onto the right back pocket of
the overalls. The word “Levi's
is
stitched in white in all capital letters on
one side only. The Tab is created to
differentiate Levi's® overalls from the many
competitors in the marketplace who were
using dark denim and an Arcuate stitch. We
had not yet trademarked the Arcuate so other
companies were using it in direct imitation
of us.
1937 The back pockets
on the overalls are sewn so that they cover
the rivets. This is in response to consumers
who complained that the rivets scratched
furniture and saddles.
The suspender buttons are
removed from the overalls. Consumers are
given snap-on buttons in case they still
want to wear suspenders.
World War 2
Changes are made to the overalls in order to
conform to rules War II set by the War
Production Board for the conservation of raw
materials. The crotch rivet, watch pocket
rivets and back cinch are removed to save
fabric and metal. The Arcuate stitching
design is removed as the thread is
decorative only and not vital to the
usefulness of the garment. In order to keep
the design on the pants, LS&CO. sewing
machine operators paint it on each pair.
1943 The Arcuate
stitching design is registered as a
trademark.
c1947 The post-war
version of the 501® jeans starts coming off
the production line. The cinch is gone
forever, the rivets are put back on the
watch pocket and the Arcuate is now stitched
with a double-needle machine which gives it
the “diamond” shape at the point where the
two lines of stitching meet. This creates
the uniform look of the Arcuate, which is in
contrast to previous years, when the single
needle application gave each Arcuate design
a unique appearance, depending on the skill
of the operator.
Early 1950s The word
LEVI'S is now stitched on both sides of the
red Tab. We are not sure why this was done.
1954 A zippered
version of the overalls is introduced and
named 501Z. This was introduced as we had
begun selling our products on the East Coast
of the United States and many people were
unfamiliar with the button fly.
Late 1950s The
leather patch is replaced by a Two Horse
patch made of heavy-duty card stock, known
as the “leather like.” This is due to the
fact that the company was selling products
nationally, and it was becoming more
expensive to use real leather. Also, the
newer automatic washing machines were very
hard on the real thing.
1960 The word
“overalls” is replaced by the word “jeans”
in advertising and on packaging. We had made
other products in the past which we called
“jeans” (specifically, denim pants for boys
in the 1930s) but our top of the line
“overalls” – 501® jeans – did not get this
name until teenagers began calling the
product “jeans” in the 1950s. No one really
knows why the word became associated with
the men's overalls, but teenagers adopted
the phrase and it became the term used by
all manufacturers.
c1961 Pre-shrunk
Levi's
jeans are
introduced.
1964 The jeans become
part of the permanent collections of the
Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
1966 The first
television commercial for Levi's
jeans is
aired. The rivets are removed from the back
pockets and replaced with bar tacking. This
is due to the fact that the strong rivets
eventually wore through the denim, exposing
them and causing the problems that led to
their being covered back in 1937: scratching
furniture.
1971 The word “Levi's®
on the
red Tab device is now stitched in white with
a capital “L” only; the “E” looks like it
changed, leading to the vintage clothing
concept of “Big E” and “little e.” This was
done to conform to the company's new
housemark – the “batwing” – which was
adopted in 1967 and in which the word
“Levi's” is meant to be the proper name of
our founder, Levi Strauss.
1981 501®
jeans for
women are introduced, with the airing of the
famous “Travis” television commercial.
1983 Cone Mills
begins to introduce XXX denim through the
use of 60” wide looms.
1984 The renowned
“501 Blues” television advertising campaign
is launched at the summer Olympic Games in
Los Angeles.
1985 LS&CO. wins the
Governor's Committee Media/advertising Award
from the New York State Office of Advocates
for the Disabled, for its positive
portrayals of disabled people in the “501
Blues” television ads.
1986 The first in a
series of innovative television commercials
for the 501®
jeans
airs in Europe. These commercials feature
classic American rock music mixed with
nostalgia and romance.
1992 Due to the
interest in “vintage” Levi's
jeans on
the part of consumers worldwide, LS&CO.
introduces the “Capital E” jean in the
United States. This also follows on the
success of the vintage model created earlier
by Levi Strauss Japan.
1993 Levi Strauss &
Co. sponsors the “Send Them Home Search,” a
contest to find the oldest pair of Levi's
jeans in
the United States. The winning pair dates to
the late 1920s.
1996 Building on the
success of the Capital E product, a new
series of vintage reproductions - called the
Levi's
Vintage
Clothing line - is introduced in stores
worldwide.
1997 LS&CO. buys a
pair of c1890 501® jeans for $25,000.
1998 The Levi's
501
jeans
celebrate 125 years of originality.
2003 LS&CO.
celebrates the 130th
anniversary of the invention of the blue
jean.
From the June 28, 1873 issue
of Pacific Rural Press
“A New Pocket Fastening -
Mr. J.W. Davis, formerly of Reno, Nevada,
but now residing in this city [San
Francisco] has just received through the
Scientific Press Patent Agency, letters
patent for an improvement in fastening the
seams of pockets. The improvement consists
in the employment of a metal rivet or eyelet
for fastening the seams. “Simple as this
device seems, nevertheless it is quite
effective, and we do not doubt that his
manufacture, of overalls especially, will
become quite popular amongst our working
men, as the overalls are made and cut in the
style of the best custom made pants. Nothing
looks more slouchy in a workman than to see
his pockets ripped open and hanging down,
and no other part of the clothing is so apt
to be torn and ripped as the pockets.
Besides it slouchy appearance, it is
inconvenient and often results in the person
losing things from his pockets. “Levi
Strauss & Co. of this city are sole agents
for the new manufacture, and will
soon place them in the market in large
quantities, so that our miners, farmers and
workingmen can supply themselves with
superior overalls.”
Source:
The above history of Levi is from the
Levi Strauss & Co. website from January
20th, 2009. In 2014 Levi's
introduced the 501 CT jeans. This
version is tapered for the consumer without
having to go to the tailor. You can
learn more about the
501 CT Jeans on our
fashion blog. In 2015 Levi's introduced
the
700 Series Stretch Denim Jeans. In
2015 Levi's introduced the
300 Shaping Series Jeans. On July 13,
2017, Levi Strauss heir Bill Goldman died in
a private plane crash near Sonoma,
California. In 2017, Levi Strauss & Co.
released a "smart jacket", an apparel they
developed in partnership with Google.
In 2018, Levi's introduced the
720 High‑Rise Super Skinny Jeans.
In 2021, Levi's announced in August 2021
they would be purchasing Beyond Yoga.
Levi Strauss said Beyond Yoga, which focuses
on body positive apparel, would operate as a
standalone division/
You may
also have interest in the
Levis
History of Women's Jeans. |