el.setAttribute("value", newVal); The rival Wite-Out would come along in 1966 just like the Monkees. Unsubscribe whenever. She formed a multimillion-dollar global company after inventing Liquid Paper. and 94% of those jobs are held by women. She was a tool-maker and highly motivated to help working women, said. Nesmith went off to World War II and while he was away, she had their only son, Michael Nesmith (later of The Monkees fame). By 1975, the company produced 25 million liquid paper bottles per year. ) { By clicking Accept All Cookies, you agree to the storing of cookies on your device to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, and assist in our marketing efforts. Bette Claire McMurray was born on March 23, 1924 in Dallas, Texas, the daughter of Christine Duval and Jesse McMurray. I remember talking to her accountant, and he looked at me and said, You know, this company should never have existed. The _ga cookie, installed by Google Analytics, calculates visitor, session and campaign data and also keeps track of site usage for the site's analytics report. On 23rd, March 1924 Bette Nesmith Graham was first seen in the world in Dallas, Texas. The cookie stores information anonymously and assigns a randomly generated number to recognize unique visitors. function initForm() { However, she continued to participate in the final manufacture of Liquid Paper. Archival materials are from the University of North Texas Special Collection, with special thanks to Morgan Davis Gieringer and her staff. }); You keep doing it over and over.. During that time, I often became discouraged, she told the magazine Texas Woman in 1979. Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. The rival Wite-Out would come along in 1966 just like the Monkees. atob(decodeURIComponent(b.pop())) : ''; setHiddenFieldValueFromUtm(wrappingDiv, sp, 'funnel-t', 't', ''); setHiddenFieldValueFromUtm(wrappingDiv, sp, 'funnel-s3', 's3', ''); They would have one son in December 1942, Robert Michael Nesmith. e.preventDefault(); A single inspiration led Graham to invent the typing correction fluid she came to call Liquid Paper. That year she applied for a patent and changed the name to the Liquid Paper Company.
bette nesmith graham interesting facts
She left her fortune to her son, who took over her foundations that empower striving women. Hey, hey! That was intentional. I wonder if we will have the courage to fully implement the type of ethical business practices she made real, some 40 years ago. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. Bette Nesmith Graham. Today's Texas Birthdays. It's also employed as a functional fluid in arts and crafts from blacksmithing to jewelry tomodeling kits. Bette Graham was now wealthy, with fabulous jewelry and a Rolls-Royce. From the start, Graham ran her company with a unique combination of spirituality, egalitarianism, and pragmatism. This cookie is set by Facebook to display advertisements when either on Facebook or on a digital platform powered by Facebook advertising, after visiting the website. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/liquid-paper-bette-nesmith-graham-1992092. setHiddenFieldValueFromUtm(wrappingDiv, sp, 'funnel-o', 'o', ''); If this cookie does not exist when HubSpot manages cookies, it is considered a new session. That plan hinged on By many counts, the ski industry is booming. But as Graham soon learned, the invention had several downsides: Graham had to find a way to fix her numerous typos. From lino cutting to surfing to childrens mental health, their hobbies and interests range far and wide. surrounding Happy Days than the potential casting of Arthur Fonzarelli. To add insult to injury, they tried to change the very formula for Liquid Paper, thus removing her right to royalties from it. She built it out of nothing. The transatlantic foursome ofMicky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith, Peter Tork and Davy Jones wrote and recorded a surprising range of music, from beat pop to country and psychedelic. This structure was a part of LPCs culture of high ethical standards, which Bette developed in 1968. effectively the mission statement written by their founder, Bette Graham, in 1968. If you purchase using the buy now button we may earn a small commission. Graham, Bette Clair McMurray (1924-1980). Which seems odd, seeing how he was a native of England. It was a profession that used to be a reliable path to the middle class, by Heather Long in the Washington Post last year. Bette Nesmith Graham is best known as Entrepreneur who has born on March 23, 1924 in Dallas, TX. Who says the Monkees were not cutting-edge musicians? Graham found a green bottle at home, wrote "Mistake Out" on a label, and gave it to her friend. $('.email-submission:not(.prevent-default)').submit(function (e) { This is used to determine if HubSpot should increment the session number and timestamps in the __hstc cookie. Ensures subsequent requests in the session window are attributed to the same session. Don't worry, the other two had good excuses. Bette Nesmith left her typing job at the bank in 1958 when Mistake Out finally began to succeed: her product was featured in office supply magazines, she had a meeting with IBM, and General Electric placed an order for 500 bottles. setHiddenFieldValueFromUtm(wrappingDiv, sp, 'funnel-r', 'r', ''); A struggling secretary created a concoction that relieved her and others around the world from the pressure of perfection. Among its offerings: During her successful run, Graham also established two philanthropic foundations one that supported women in the arts, and another that offered assistance to disadvantaged women. She is known for her independent films and documentaries, including one about Alexander Graham Bell. hp_interval = setInterval(function(){ Bette Nesmith Graham Entrepreneur #83111 Most Popular Boost Birthday March 23, 1924 Birthplace Dallas , TX DEATH DATE May 12, 1980 ( age 56 ) Birth Sign Aries About Inventor of Liquid Paper who gave countless students a quick way to correct writing mistakes. Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics: Includes Elizabeth Lucas Pinckney (indigo plant dye), Martha Coston (signal flares), Fannie Farmer (standardized recipes), Madam C. J. Walker (hair-care products), S. Josephine Baker (child hygiene), Barbara McClintock (genetics), Bette Nesmith Graham (Liquid Paper), Grace Hopper (computer-programming language), Ruth Handler (the Barbie doll), and . (2021, September 1). var captchaEl = document.createElement('div'); Shoot us a note here. Then, just a few months later, Bette Nesmith Graham suffered a stroke and died at 59 years old. Graham spent heavily on advertising, showcasing her product during prime-time TV programs like The Tonight Show and in Glamour and Fortune magazine spreads. Can you recognize these stars on the cover of TV Guide in 1970? Her work as a secretary and her background in art were inspiration for her invention. In November, a verified but fake Eli Lilly and Co. account announced that the drugmakers insulin was free. Graham continued experimenting with the makeup of the substance until she achieved the perfect combination of paint and several other chemicals. searchParams, She was a typist, and artist, a secretary, a mother, and inventor of liquid paper. Soon, all the secretaries in the building were asking for some, too. That was intentional. Soon the other secretaries wanted their own supply, and she found herself staying up late, filling bottles in her kitchen. They had accommodation for differently-abled people, including employees who used wheelchairs and a program for blind employees. Bette Nesmith Graham whipped up the first batch of "Liquid Paper" in her kitchen in 1951, originally calling the stuff Mistake Out. }); } Graham with her son Michael in 1957 (via newspaper archives). Her mother owned a knitting store and taught her to paint from a young age; her father, a manager at an auto parts company, imparted the values of consistency and hard work. if ((existingVal == null || existingVal == '' || existingVal == defaultValue) && (newVal != null && newVal != '')) { if (false) { Born in 1924 in Dallas, Texas, Bette Graham dropped out of high school at the age of seventeen and went to secretarial school. https://www.thoughtco.com/liquid-paper-bette-nesmith-graham-1992092 (accessed March 4, 2023). return null; The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that in 2018, secretaries and administrative professionals account for some 2 million jobs and 94% of those jobs are held by women. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Bette loved to paint in her spare time. She didnt know it then, but she was on the brink of something magical. There was also focused emphasis on advancing women and black staff into senior roles. That secretary was Elizabeth Clair McMurray Nesmith Graham, the, With no background in chemical engineering, but guided by her side hustle of painting and graphic design, Bette Graham created the first correctional paint to fix document typos. var prev_email = getCookieValue('funnel_email'); }; By joining Kidadl you agree to Kidadls Terms of Use and Privacy Policy and consent to receiving marketing communications from Kidadl. As they say, every story starts somewhere, and Bette Nesmith Grahamshowed us that it also ends with inspiration. Slowly, he became more involved in the business and attempted to take power away from her, prompting her to file for a second divorce in 1975. That same year, she divorced Robert Graham. } else { You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. Old Bette . She also liked spending some time with her son. A random, unique, device identifier, stored as a 1st party cookie, to enable targeted advertising, This cookie is set by LiveIntent. There is little to glean information about her death. That included giving shelter and counseling for battered women and college scholarships for mature women. They include The Gihon Foundation, womens scholarships, and counseling. defaultValue Biography of Bette Nesmith Graham, Inventor of Liquid Paper. captchaVersion.value = 'true'; var newVal = searchParams.get(utmName) || getCookieValue(cookieName); According to sources, Bettes product received more demand in over 40 countries. This cookie, set by Cloudflare, is used to support Cloudflare Bot Management. if (el != null) { Born Bette Clair McMurray in Dallas in March 1924, she grew up in San Antonio. That technological shift (and the ensuing increase in typographical errors) became a source of inspiration for a new product in the 1950s. Comment: In 1976, they divorced and he tried to cut Graham out of the company by changing the formula and booting her off the board. She described herself as a "feminist who wants freedom for myself and everybody else.". function initCaptchaFormV2() { Graham became so devoted to her venture that she accidentally signed a letter at her job with the notation The Mistake Out Company. She was promptly fired, giving her a chance to become a full-time small business owner in 1958. Sales grew in tandem with exposure. And thats why we built Trends to show you up-and-coming market opportunities about to explode. Containers that took up to We use cookies to make the Hustle website a better place. captchaApiScriptEl.defer = true; All of this growth happened without any outside investment. var hp_ts = 0; In due time, her mix would be in virtually every office desk and supply cabinet around the world. "Biography of Bette Nesmith Graham, Inventor of Liquid Paper." She was a bad typist to boot. The substance was Liquid Paper, the correction fluid that relieved secretaries and writers of all stripes from the pressure of perfection. Bette was born to Jesse McMurray and Christine Duval in Dallas, Texas. This cookie is set by Microsoft Clarity. Click here for more Fun Facts! But as her operation took off, the people closest to her tried to take advantage of her success. Her mother was an artist, but her own ambition to be an artist was rechanneled when her marriage ended in divorce. At 19 years of age, she got married to Warren Nesmith. That rankled her to no end, Nesmith said to me over the phone. But she was also a budding product marketing genius: Over several decades, she identified a need in the market, organically grew her business, staved off competition, and bootstrapped her way to a $47.5m exit $173m in todays money. She opted to sell the company to Gillette Corporation for over $47.5 million in 1979. With him, she had a son Michael Nesmith.Michael Nesmith is a musician and producer in his own right. This cookie is set by Google and is used to distinguish users. From its fruition in 1956, Grahams invention is now in virtually every office desk and supply cabinet around the world. She called her vision the Statement of Policy.
var v3RecaptchaResponseEl = document.getElementById('recaptcha-response-v3'); Bette worked for Texas Bank and Trust as a secretary. The growing venture operated first out of her garage, then a small storage unit in her backyard and eventually, in 1965, in a four room single family home. Bette Nesmith Graham (March 23, 1924 - May 12, 1980) was an American typist, commercial artist, and the inventor of white-out. For a dollar an hour, they worked out of her garage, using plastic ketchup bottles with funnel-like spouts to squeeze the substance into small nail polish bottles, applying labels by hand and cutting the tips of the brushes inside the caps at an angle. Most easily identified by his trademark blue wool hat with pompom, Nesmith fashioned a diversified career within music and also in film. A few years ago, Kimi Coy and her mother, Carolyn Benyshek, booked a mother-daughter trip to Singapore. Bettes original product was called Mistake Out, which she formed a company around in 1956. Anyone in the organization no matter their role could be appointed and included in committees that made decisions for the whole organization. After few trials and fails, Bette tried an odorless and colorless paint with a watercolor brush. On 23rd, March 1924 Bette Nesmith Graham was first seen in the world in Dallas, Texas. Davy Jones had to be written out of an episode so he could attend his sister's wedding. The bitterness remained, and Robert Graham maneuvered to have the company bar her from making any corporate decisions. This does not influence our choices. We recommend that these ideas are used as inspiration, that ideas are undertaken with appropriate adult supervision, and that each adult uses their own discretion and knowledge of their children to consider the safety and suitability. The domain name where the _lc2_fpi cookie was stored. [5] As part of its effort to acknowledge prominent people who had been previously overlooked, in 2018 The New York Times published a belated obituary for her.[6]. This ensures that behavior in subsequent visits to the same site will be attributed to the same user ID. At Kidadl we pride ourselves on offering families original ideas to make the most of time spent together at home or out and about, wherever you are in the world. As her son Michael later recalled, financial pressures would cause his mother to frequently burst into tears of panic.. Her mother, Christine Duval, was an artist and a businesswoman who opened her own knitting store and taught Bette oil painting. Bette married Warren Nesmith, her longtime sweetheart, in 1942, just before when he left to serve in the Second World War. Graham poses for a photo later in life (University of North Texas archives). She turned her whiteout, Liquid Paper, into an. error.style = ''; For more information, check out our Privacy Policy. This included positions in management and sales, not just operations. Bette was 56 years old when she died in 1980 in Richardson, Texas. 400 young actors and musicians auditioned, the potential casting of Arthur Fonzarelli, 11 incredibly cool facts about Burt Reynolds, 6 familiar characters who got their own ''spin-off babies'' cartoons, 12 Sally Field roles that range from iconic to obscure. The plant had equipment that could produce 500 bottles a minute. Overcoming fear is all there is to success. In the mid-70s, well before Zappos adopted a. , Bette was innovating with organizational structure. This article contains incorrect information, This article doesnt have the information Im looking for, Other Interesting Bette Nesmith Graham Facts And Trivia. setHiddenFieldValueFromUtm(wrappingDiv, sp, 'funnel-s2', 's2', ''); One reader pointed out it was "more green" to fix a printed page than to print it again. Linkedin sets this cookie. WhatsApp. Fast Facts: Bette Nesmith Graham Known For: Invention of the correcting fluid known as Liquid Paper Born: March 23, 1924 in Dallas Texas Parents: Christine Duval and Jesse McMurray Died: May 12, 1980 in Richardson, Texas Education: Left San Antonio's Alamo Heights School at 17 Born: 23-Mar-1924 Birthplace: Corpus Christi, TX Died: 12-May-1980 Location of death: Fort Worth, TX Cause of death: unspecified Gender: Female Religion: Christian Science Race or Ethnicity: White Sexual orientation: Straight Occupation: Inventor, Business Nationality: United States Executive summary: Correction fluid Bette Clair McMurray was a .
Since 1851, obituaries in The New York Times have been dominated by white men. American typist and inventor of Liquid Paper (19241980), "From The Folks Who Gave You Liquid Paper", "Graham, Bette Clair McMurray (19241980)", "Overlooked No More: Bette Nesmith Graham, Who Invented Liquid Paper", Bette Nesmith Graham, Liquid Paper Inventor, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bette_Nesmith_Graham&oldid=1129392668, Short description is different from Wikidata, Pages using infobox person with multiple spouses, Pages using infobox person with multiple parents, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 25 December 2022, at 03:03. She established two foundations, the Gihon Foundation, which gave grants and financial support to promote women in the arts, and the Bette Clair McMurray Foundation, which did the same for women in business. The secretary that invented this product was, by many accounts, a bad typist but an extraordinary entrepreneur. We dont spam. Read further to know more about her early and later success. } Bette was passionate about painting and sculpting, if not particularly skilled. She left her fortune to her son, who took over her foundations and continued to dole out money to striving women. We try our very best, but cannot guarantee perfection. You have to face fears and doubts constantly. Identifies a new users first session. setHiddenFieldValueFromUtm(wrappingDiv, sp, 'funnel-oc', 'oc', ''); Money does not solve problems. function getCookie(name) { [4] Additionally, a portion of Graham's estate financed the Betty Clair McMurray Foundation, which focuses on supporting projects such as the exhibit Texas Women, A Celebration of History, career guidance for unwed mothers, shelter and counseling for battered women, and college scholarships for mature women. clearInterval(hp_interval); She solicited wholesalers and traveled from Dallas to San Antonio and Houston on weekends to market her product. Kidadl is independent and to make our service free to you the reader we are supported by advertising. if (form.find('.email-form-submit-message').length < 1) { Any information you provide to us via this website may be placed by us on servers located in countries outside the EU if you do not agree to such placement, do not provide the information. The typos piled up, and when she tried to use an eraser, carbon ink would smear all over the page. When I found out that talent wouldnt support me, then I realized that I would have to give that up, she said in interview for the Business Archives Project at North Texas State University in 1980. After living with her husband for some time, she opted to look for a part-time job. It has grown by increasing productivity and by stretching capabilities to meet the demand, she said. By 1951, she had worked her way up to the position of executive secretary for W.W. Overton, the Chairman of the Board of the Texas Bank and Trust. March 23, The sensitive keypad lent itself to more typographical errors. So she sneaked some fast-drying white tempera paint into work and concealed her typos with a watercolor brush. Bette Nesmith Graham was born March 23rd, 1924 ("Bette Nesmith Graham: Liquid Paper Inventor," n.d.). She died on May 12, 1980, at the age of 56 years.Bette Nesmith Graham attended Alamo Heights High School in San Antonio, Texas, until she was 17. Nesmith married Robert Graham in 1962, and he joined the business as well. var subForm = wrappingDiv.getElementsByClassName('email-submission')[0]; } To meet demand, she turned her garage into a mini packing plant, paying her son and his friends $1/hour to fill the little glass bottles and affix them with handwritten labels. She was a difficult student in school as her stubborn personality led her to clash often with her teachers. So, in 1979, the inventor of Liquid Paper sold the company to Gillette for $47.5 million, plus a deal for royalties. Bellis, Mary. Our recommended activities are based on age but these are a guide. We also link to other websites, but are not responsible for their content. Starting as a secretary, she found a way to solve typos for millions of people and grew a visionary corporation around it. She married Warren Nesmith in 1941. When her husband returned home from World War II, the couple got divorced and Graham was left to single-handedly raise her child. By 1967, the company had its own corporate headquarters and automated production plant, and sales were in excess of one million units per year. LPC also developed an expanded set of employee benefits that were highly uncommon for the time. Unfortunately, they divorced in 1946 after Warren Nesmith came back home.Bette remarried Robert Graham in 1962. Bette would go on to perfect her product and build a fortune around it, eventually creating foundations that did help empower working women. In that tone, she opted to paint an error instead of erasing it completely. She continued to refine her recipe in her kitchen laboratory, which was based on a formula for tempura paint she found at the local library, with assistance from a paint company employee and a chemistry teacher at a local school. Over the next twenty five years, Bette and others grew the small start-up through traditional sales to distributors and promotion within the office product industry. Used in synchronizing the MUID across Microsoft domains. When the other secretaries realized how well the invention worked, they flooded Graham with requests for their own supplies. initCaptchaFormV2(); In fact, she fathomed more, unlike her colleagues. She was also the mother of musician and producer Michael Nesmith of The Monkees.