Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

The two settings on a stapler

Depends on how long you want papers attached

Dear M.A.: Why do staplers have two settings on the base plate for the direction in which the staple bends? Everyone (I know of) uses the setting that bends the staple inward. What is the other setting used for? — R. Wallace, El Cajon

Sponsored
Sponsored

According to the major desk stapler manufacturers, that little-used groove is for the mewling milquetoasts who lack the decisiveness of your circle of friends. When your pals hook together a wad of papers, they mean business. They use the channel that double-bends the staple and clenches the points toward the middle. Those sheaves are united for life. The other setting, the one that splays the staple points outward, is for temporarily attaching papers that are intended to be separated again. The attachment is looser, and it’s easier to remove the staple without chewing up the corners of the pages.

In the beginning was the seamstress’s common straight pin, a metal shaft with a point at one end and some kind of stopper at the other. Before the advent of the mechanical stapler, papers were often hooked together with these lowly devices. That mysterious alternative setting on today’s staplers is more or less a holdover from the straight-pin days. In fact, in the lingo of the desk-stapler professional, you’re “stapling” papers together if you use the common setting, but you’re “pinning” them if you use the looser, temporary setting. And that “base plate” is technically known as “the anvil.” Oddly enough, the little channels in the anvil have no names at all, as far as I can discover. (Are professional design engineers reduced to referring to them as “the little staple-bender-groove thingies”? Hard to imagine.) But since the grooves have remained pretty much unchanged since the dawn of staplerdom, I suppose there’s not much reason to refer to them at all. Except, of course, in correspondence with Matthew Alice.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Reader 1st place writing contest winner gets kudos

2nd place winner not so much
Next Article

2024 continues to impress with yellowfin much closer to San Diego than they should be

New rockfish regulations coming this week as opener approaches

Dear M.A.: Why do staplers have two settings on the base plate for the direction in which the staple bends? Everyone (I know of) uses the setting that bends the staple inward. What is the other setting used for? — R. Wallace, El Cajon

Sponsored
Sponsored

According to the major desk stapler manufacturers, that little-used groove is for the mewling milquetoasts who lack the decisiveness of your circle of friends. When your pals hook together a wad of papers, they mean business. They use the channel that double-bends the staple and clenches the points toward the middle. Those sheaves are united for life. The other setting, the one that splays the staple points outward, is for temporarily attaching papers that are intended to be separated again. The attachment is looser, and it’s easier to remove the staple without chewing up the corners of the pages.

In the beginning was the seamstress’s common straight pin, a metal shaft with a point at one end and some kind of stopper at the other. Before the advent of the mechanical stapler, papers were often hooked together with these lowly devices. That mysterious alternative setting on today’s staplers is more or less a holdover from the straight-pin days. In fact, in the lingo of the desk-stapler professional, you’re “stapling” papers together if you use the common setting, but you’re “pinning” them if you use the looser, temporary setting. And that “base plate” is technically known as “the anvil.” Oddly enough, the little channels in the anvil have no names at all, as far as I can discover. (Are professional design engineers reduced to referring to them as “the little staple-bender-groove thingies”? Hard to imagine.) But since the grooves have remained pretty much unchanged since the dawn of staplerdom, I suppose there’s not much reason to refer to them at all. Except, of course, in correspondence with Matthew Alice.

Comments
Sponsored
Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

March is typically windy, Sage scents in the foothills

Butterflies may cross the county
Next Article

Making Love to Goats, Rachmaninoff, and Elgar

Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.