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Jigsaw Puzzles? Brilliant Brainwave Or What?

By Peter Stewart

Republish: EasyPublish™
Published: 12Mar2012
Word count: 1021
Viewed: 86 time(s)

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"Who invented jigsaw puzzles?" The idea of cutting up a perfectly beautiful picture into small pieces and then putting them all together again really sounds quite ridiculous.

Were jigsaw puzzles invented by the King's Men? Think back a bit. When Humpty Dumpty fell off the wall, all the King's horses and all the King's men couldn't put him together again. Of course they couldn't. Horses don't have hands so how could they possibly fit all those little pieces of egg shell together again!

Or maybe it was the ancient Eqyptians? What did a court official do when he dropped a cuneiform tablet breaking it into a hundred pieces? I'm sure he tried to do something like that before the Pharoah noticed and banished him to a life of slavery making bricks of straw and mud!

No, it was a mapmaker! A man by the name of John Spilsbury is given credit for having invented the first jigsaw puzzle in 1767. Mr Spilsbury was a mapmaker who stuck a map of the world onto a piece of wood and then cut out each country. It was his first puzzle. Sorting out all the countries and putting them together again was certainly a novel way of learning geography. Nowadays I think there are some pieces we would rather leave off a world map - could be a strategy for world peace! Anyway, let's not get sidetracked now ...

These jigsaw puzzles were called "Dissected Maps" and soon became popular amongst the British aristocracy. Developments continued and the rich had wooden puzzles and the poor had cardboard ones. Nothing much has changed. These days children are the rich who have the wooden puzzles and adults are the poor who have cardboard ones. Doesn't seem fair, does it? The Great Depression saw the development of die cut, mass produced cardboard jigsaw puzzles. During these dark days it became a wonderful,inexpensive source of family entertainment.

Sewing machine technology

A great development in jigsaw puzzle technology came about in the 1930's. A gentleman by the name of Charles Russell from Massachusetts attached a saw blade to his wife's sewing machine and used this for cutting out the wooden jigsaw puzzles. If I were his wife, I don't think I'd have been too impressed. I rather like using my sewing machine for myself.

Modern developments

Fantastic developments have continued since then, with a great improvement in the quality of cardboard and cutting techniques. It is also really satisfying to be able to frame a completed jigsaw puzzle, a constant reminder of all your hard work and also a good way of showing off to your friends. And it hasn't stopped there. You now get customized jigsaw puzzles with companies producing jigsaw puzzles with your own photos. What a wonderful gift to yourself or a loved one.

If you would like to know more about these incredible custom jigsaw puzzles head on over to our custom jigsaw puzzles site to discover more.

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