Rubber band gun Rubber band gun A rubber band gun, often abbreviated to RBG, is a toy gun used to fire one or more rubber bands (or "elastic bands"). Rubber band guns are often used in live-action games such as Assassins, in which they are common and popular toy weapons. They are also common in offices and classrooms. Rubber band guns have been popular toys that date back to the invention of rubber bands, which were patented in England on March 17, 1845 by Stephen Perry. This is the simplest form of rubber band gun. Its firing mechanism consists solely of a clothespin.
Rubber-Tip Pencil Co. v. Howard inventor clearly was the form of the attachment, not of the head. The Court then turned to the piece of rubber with a hole in it: "the cavity must be made smaller than the pencil and so constructed as to encompass its sides and be held thereon by the inherent elasticity of the rubber." But that "adds nothing to the patentable character of the invention." The reason was: Everybody knew when the patent was applied for that if a solid substance was inserted into a cavity in a piece of rubber smaller than itself, the rubber would cling to it.