King Camp Gillette life and biography

King Camp Gillette was an American businessman of French family Gillette, popularly known as the inventor of the safety razor, although several models were in existence prior to Gillette's design. Gillette's innovation was the thin, inexpensive, disposable blade of stamped steel.

Raised in the Chicago area, he spent his early career as a traveling salesman. In the late 1890s he was inspired to create a disposable shaving razor, partly out of personal interest and partly out of a desire to create a product consumers could dispose of before buying another one. He teamed with a machinist-inventor named William Nickerson, and in 1901 Gillette formed American Safety Razor, which was soon changed to Gillette Safety Razor. Awarded a patent in 1904, Gillette's business was so successful he effectively retired in 1910, while keeping a figurehead position with the Gillette company. After leaving the business world, Gillette turned his attention to planting the seeds for a socialist utopia, writing books and spending money to advocate a "world corporation" that would supercede an international system based on national borders.

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