Bette Nesmith

Bette Nesmith (1924 – 1980) was an American typist, the inventor of Liquid Paper, and mother of musician and producer Michael Nesmith of The Monkees.

It was very difficult to erase mistakes made by early electric typewriters, which caused problems for her. She put tempera water-based paint in a bottle to correct her mistakes, and secretly used her white correction paint for five years, making some improvements with help from her son’s high school chemistry teacher. Some superiors admonished her against using it, but coworkers frequently sought her ‘paint out.’ She eventually began marketing her typewriter correction fluid as ‘Mistake Out’ in 1956, and later as ‘Liquid Paper.’

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