Innovations

Today we celebrate bubble gum – created 80 years ago by Walter E. Diemer. "It was an accident," Diemer said. "I was doing something else and ended up with something with bubbles." What Mr. Diemer was supposed to be doing was working as an accountant for the Fleer Chewing Gum Company in Philadelphia; what he wound up doing was playing with new gum recipes. Diemer, 23 years old in 1928, saw bubbles; he saw the possibilities and an industry was born. Diemer never received royalties for his invention.