![]() Sam realized that his magnets had much more potential and started an advertising company that sold some of the world’s first magnetic fridge advertisements. He found that the magnets he created suited the purpose perfectly and held onto surfaces much better as the whole of the “magnet” was magnetized. Sam Hardcastle created a way to mix iron oxide, essentially iron dust, with vinyl, a slightly flexible plastic. ![]() He had been tasked by companies in the space industry with inventing a form of magnetic letters and numbers which were completely magnetic, instead of just being a piece of plastic with a magnet attached. The first fridge magnets that were actually designed for the purpose of being used on a fridge were invented by a man called Sam Hardcastle. It was around this time that it became common to attach a magnet to plastic numbers or letters, which were used as teaching aids. Unsurprisingly, it wasn’t until after fridges were invented that we began to use magnets on them, and this didn’t come until around the middle of the 20 th Century. Wolf.Īlthough fridges didn’t see widespread use until General Electric released their “Monitor-Top” fridge in 1927. It wasn’t even until 1913 that the first commercial fridge was invented by a man called Fred W. How did we start to use magnets on our fridges? What are magnets used for?Īs we’ve already mentioned, we’ve known about magnets for thousands of years already, with the earliest records dating back to around 2500 years ago in Greece, India, and China.īy around 1200 AD it was discovered that you could use a magnet to give you a true bearing of north or south, and from this discovery, compasses were born.Ĭompasses completely revolutionized how we travel and see the world, allowing travelers to navigate without using the sun or stars, which was generally more unreliable.įast forward to the 20 th Century, and magnets were beginning to be used in a wide variety of ways in electronics, motors, and so on. ![]() You can learn more about what magnets are and how they work here. These magnets are constantly being recharged and magnetized by an electric current, which makes them very strong magnets. Some are created by mixing iron and another element such as vinyl or ceramic, which are then magnetized (changed so they also have a magnetic field) by a more powerful magnetic source.Īnother common form of a magnet is an electromagnet, which is a critical component in most types of motors. Magnets can come in a variety of shapes and forms. The first to discover the use of magnetism to point a piece of metal in a constant direction were the ancient Chinese, who used their early forms of the compass to practice Feng Shui.īy a simple definition, they’re an object that gives out magnetic fields, which in turn attract metals such as steel, iron, nickel, and cobalt. Some of the first people to discover that one type of stone would attract other iron-rich stones were the ancient Greeks. What even are magnets?įor thousands of years now we’ve known of the existence of magnetism, but it wasn’t really until relatively recently that we’ve figured out what it actually is, and how it works. We’re going to take a look into the history of fridge magnets and explain how these handy placeholders ended up on our fridges.īefore we do that, though, it’s best if we quickly refresh what magnets are exactly. If you’re a curious person then maybe you’ve stood in front of your fridge and pondered why we use them, and how they came to be. It’s become increasingly common to find a household fridge that is covered in some sort of magnet, whether it’s a promotional magnet or a souvenir. Many of us have grown up with magnets adorning our fridges, but we’ve never really questioned why.
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