How heavy is a paperclip?

Paperclips are the classic example of something that weighs a gram, and reference works repeat it: Wikipedia says regular metal paper clips weigh about a gram. That is a fair round number, but it depends a lot on the size.

Weighing boxes gives a sharper answer. A European stationery wholesaler lists boxes of 100 nickel-plated clips at 43 g for the 28 mm and 32 mm sizes, 49 g for 33 mm and 117 g for 50 mm. Durable’s box of 100 copper-plated 32 mm clips is listed at 48 g. So the ordinary office clip is a little under half a gram, and it takes a large 50 mm clip to reach the full gram.

Size matters so much because a clip is just one piece of bent wire. A longer clip uses more wire, and big clips are usually made from thicker wire as well. A standard US clip sold to the federal government is made from steel wire 0.034 in (0.86 mm) thick.

The double-loop shape everyone knows is the Gem clip. It was most likely being made in Britain by the Gem Manufacturing Company in the early 1870s, and an 1883 article was already praising Gem clips as better than ordinary pins. The earliest known picture of its modern form is in an 1893 advertisement.

In 1899 William Middlebrook patented a machine for making wire paper clips, and his patent drawing shows a Gem clip, so the design was established by then. The Norwegian Johan Vaaler is often called the inventor, but the clip he patented in 1901 was a different, less practical shape that was never made.

During the German occupation of Norway in the Second World War, Norwegians wore paperclips as a quiet sign of resistance, meaning “we are bound together”. The occupiers banned them, and people caught wearing one risked severe punishment. The story later fed the belief that a Norwegian had invented the clip.