Undergarment Boudreaux showed the world that an American woman could establish and run a company, and she also caused a revolution in the underwear industry. In 1913, a New York socialite named Mary Phelps Jacob created the first modern brassiere by tying two handkerchiefs together with ribbon. Jacob's original intention was to cover the whalebone sticking out of her corset, which was visible through her sheer dress. Jacob began making brassieres for her family and friends, and news of the garment soon spread by word of mouth. By 1914, Jacob had a patent for her design and was marketing it throughout
Phelps Phelps Phelps was nine, worked as a lawyer, but came from a family of shippers. His grandfather was William Walter Phelps, a politician who served multiple terms in the United States House of Representatives out of New Jersey's 5th congressional district and as the United States ambassador to Austria-Hungary; his great-grandfathers were John Jay Phelps and Joseph Earl Sheffield. In 1899, his mother divorced his father and took the children to Teaneck, New Jersey, where they were raised with the help of their grandmother Ellen Maria. Shortly after arriving in New Jersey, Phelps' mother gave him her last name, and he