Leo Gerstenzang

Leo Gerstenzang (June 3, 1892 – January 31, 1961) was a Polish-American inventor who, in 1923, created the first contemporary cotton swab or Q-Tips.One is: One day in 1923, Leo Gerstenzang found himself watching his wife, Ziuta, applying cotton wads to toothpicks in an attempt to reach hard-to-clean areas.1952),[2] it would appear that the first commercial producer of cotton tipped applicators was a Mrs. Hazel Tietjen Forbis, who manufactured them in her home.She also owned a patent on the article, numbered 1,652,108, dated December 6, 1927, and sold the product under the appellation Baby Nose-Gay.[2] Gerstenzang was born into a Jewish family in Warsaw, then part of the Congress Kingdom of Poland.
cotton swabanecdotestoothpicksPatentJohnson & JohnsonJewishWarsawCongress KingdomPolandChicagoAmerican Jewish Joint Distribution CommitteeNew York CityBrandeis Universitypublic domain