Quote Originally Posted by Father Bill View Post
The story I heard was that Levi Strauss ended up with a surplus of the darned stuff and made pants with rivets for miners, not to mention his name and his fortune. And that happened in the U.S.A.
Yay! Another chance to air my inner Clavin!

It was during the Nevada or California gold rushes. He had an abundance of tent canvas but noted that there was a shortage of work clothing for miners. The results were jeans, named for the fabric. He put rivets in the crotch, which led to many a yelp around the cowboy camp fires of later years. Wrangler removed the crotch rivets and took over a huge share of the cowboy market.