Gideon Sundback unzipped by Google Doodle

The Google Doodle has a history of celebrating important events or birthdays of interesting historical people with creative, sometimes interactive interfaces on its main page. Tuesday, April 24 the Doodle is a zipper that when unzipped takes you to the search results for Gideon Sundback - inventor of the zipper.

Sundback was born in Sweden April 24, 1880. After completing his studies in Sweden and then in Germany, he emigrated to the United States in 1905, where he began working for Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company in Pittsburgh. Sundback was working on the zipper and in 1913 he invented the first version that wasn't based on the hook-and-eye system, so it was dubbed the "Hookless Fastener No. 1."

A year later Sundback reached the version with interlocking teeth, which was essentially the modern zipper we still use today, though the vernacular "zipper" was coined by B.F. Goodrich in 1923.

Sundback died of a heart condition in 1954 and was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2006.