This patent solves the ‘over or under?’ toilet paper debate

THE age old argument about whether toilet paper should sit over or under the roll has finally been solved by a 1891 patent document.

Over or under? Toilet paper debate solved

THE age old argument about whether toilet paper should sit over or under the roll has finally been solved.

According to this 1891 patent from New York businessman Seth Wheeler, toilet paper was originally designed to have the paper sitting ON TOP of the toilet roll.

Writer Owen Williams found The Toilet Paper Roll patent online and tweeted it to his 8,000 followers on Wednesday,

The patent for toilet paper should settle the over vs under debate pic.twitter.com/arZl6l6ALn

— Owen Williams (@ow) March 17, 2015

“Be it known that I, Seth Wheeler, of the city and county of Albany, and State of New York, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Wrapping or Toilet Paper Rolls,” the patent reads.

Mr Wheeler, who was the owner of the Albany Perforated Wrapping Paper Company, goes on to explain his genius invention — perforated paper sheets.

“My invention consists of a roll of connected sheets of paper for toilet use, said roll having incisions at intervals extending from the side of the web toward the centre, but not meeting, and terminating in an angular out, whereby the slight connection left may be separated without injury to the connected sheets,” the patent reads.

But the path to inventing the humble toilet roll wasn’t always easy for Mr Wheeler.

“A difficulty with rolls of this character as heretofore manufactured has been due to the width of the bond uniting the sheets, which it has been necessary to make of considerable strength to withstand the tension of winding, but which it is desirable should be as trail as may be when the roll is unwound, otherwise the sheets do not separate with certainty and many of them are torn,” he explains.

”With this construction one sheet may be separated from the next without liability of the incisions turning in a direction parallel with the web and tearing off a considerable part of the contiguous sheet. At the same time I wind rolls containing any desired number of sheets.”

Mystery solved.

Originally published as This patent solves the ‘over or under?’ toilet paper debate