The legal pad, popularly known in the Philippines as "yellow pad", was said to be invented in 1888 by Thomas W. Holley. Thomas worked at a paper mill in Holyoke, Massachusetts, USA. The paper mill produces lots of paper scraps resulting from cutting paper into the right size. To earn extra income, he used these paper scraps to produce cheap papers which he can sell.
The resulting product was very favorable to others because of its low price. Thomas quit his job and started his own company named American Pad & Paper LLC, or Ampad. The papers Thomas produced were probably not yellow in color because the dye that will be used to color the papers will add to the production cost. No one exactly knows why today's legal pads are yellow in color.
There are some hypotheses regarding today's legal pads' color. Some said that the papers were dyed to conceal the fact that these legal pads were from various paper scraps, old and new. Since papers turn yellow in color as they aged, it would be easy to find out if the company or store is selling old or new stocks, hence the need to hide old parts of the papers using yellow dye. Others said that the yellow color has stimulating effects on the eyes. As of this day, legal pads exist in a variety of colors like blue, pink, and green. Note that it will cost 10 to 20% more to produce yellow legal pads that plain white pads. How about you? What is your hypothesis regarding the color of the modern legal "yellow" pad? Share your hypothesis here! Have some big questions? Send your questions here and we will try to find answers. |