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Trapper Keeper

by Jon Wyant for Mead · product · 1978

unverified

three-ring binder by Mead featuring sliding plastic rings, vertical-pocket folders called Trappers, and a wrap-around flap with metal snap closure, later switched to velcro. Jon Wyant, director of new product development at Mead, designed the binder and named it, working from a brief by marketing executive E. Bryant Crutchfield; Wyant held the 1975 patent for the diagonal folder pocket and the 1976 patent for the notepad with pencil clip. test-marketed in Wichita, Kansas in August 1978 with feedback cards that returned 1,500 responses, then rolled out nationally in summer 1981.

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  • Pee-Chee

    referenced

    Crutchfield looked to the Pee-Chee folder design as a model for vertical pockets that would secure papers when the folder closed. The Trapper folders' angled vertical pocket design was directly derived from this mechanism.

    “Unlike the PeeChee—which had straight up-and-down vertical pockets—Crutchfield's portfolios had angled pockets, with multiplication tables, weight conversions, and rulers on them.”
    source ↗