BETTE NESMITH GRAHAM (March 23, 1924–May 12, 1980) was the inventor and businesswoman who made a fortune from her invention “Liquid Paper,” a product which along with its competitors such as WiteOut, allowed secretaries to quickly correct typing mistakes.
Bette Nesmith put some tempera water-based paint, colored to match the stationery she used, into a bottle and took her watercolor brush to the office. She used this to surreptitiously correct her typing mistakes, [ihc-hide-content ihc_mb_type=”show” ihc_mb_who=”2,3,5″ ihc_mb_template=”1″ ] which her boss never noticed. Soon another secretary saw the new invention and asked for some of the correcting fluid. Graham found a green bottle at home, wrote “Mistake Out” on a label, and gave it to her friend.
Soon, all the secretaries in the building were asking for some, too. She continued to refine her recipe in her kitchen laboratory, which was based on a formula for tempura paint she found at the local library, with assistance from a paint company employee and a chemistry teacher at a local school. In 1956, Bette Nesmith started the Mistake Out Company: her son Michael and his friends filled bottles for her customers. Nevertheless, she made little money despite working nights and weekends to fill orders.
Bette Nesmith left her typing job at the bank in 1958 when Mistake Out finally began to succeed: her product was featured in office supply magazines, she had a meeting with IBM, and General Electric placed an order for 500 bottles.
Although some stories say she was fired from the bank for signing her name with the “Mistake Out Company,” her own Gihon Foundation biography reports she simply started working part-time then left as the company succeeded. She became a full-time small business owner, applied for a patent, and changed the name to the Liquid Paper Company.[/ihc-hide-content]
