Jeans of the Old West by Michael Harris

“Perhaps the most reliable source was tapped by Ed Cray for his 1978 book Levi’s. In 1874, Jacob Davis gave testimony in a suit against A. B. Elfet & Co for patent infringement. According to Cray in the transcript, Jacob tells of getting the idea while making a pair of pants for his neighbor. The neighbor’s wife had requested a strong pair of pants for her husband, so Jacob used the strongest material he had in the shop—10 oz duck that he had been using for making horse blankets. Sitting in the place he usually sat to make the blankets he finished sewing the pants, and lying before him on the table were the copper rivets de used on the horse blankets. Davis’s statement concluded, ‘…And the thought struck me to fasten the pockets with those rivets.’”

-Michael Harris, 2016