How inventor of $150,000,000 product died without his fortune after selling creation for just $400
One man invented a tool that millions of people use across the world every single day, yet he sold it for a fraction of its true price and watched its value increase beyond $150,000,000 before dying without a fortune.
Striking gold with an invention can be life-changing for the lucky few who make it big, because often something simple as a revision on a widely used item can make you millions of dollars.
We've seen it with plenty of artists before that die before anyone ever appreciates and values their work, but one inventor was forced to sell his genius creation for far below its expected value, and lived to see it become one of the world's most used products.
What was the $150,000,000 product?
As shared by simulation master Zack D Films on YouTube, American inventor and mechanic Walter Hunt made a simple yet incredibly effective revision on the basic metal pin, creating the safety pin that we know today.
"He twisted a piece of wire into a coil, creating a spring that allowed it to open and close. He then added a simple clasp to cover the sharp point," the video explains.
That became the safety bin in a design that hasn't really changed in the 200 years since Hunt first made it, and it offered significant benefits over the standard open ended pin which brought with it significant risk of injury and infection.
How much did Walter Hunt sell the safety pin for?
Burdened with the pressure of a $15 debt at the time, Hunt made the painful yet essential decision to sell off the patent for the safety pin for 'just' $400. This allowed him to pay off his debts and live for a little while off of the back of his creation, but the success of the safety pin would likely become bittersweet for Hunt for the rest of his life.
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Businessmen would make a fortune selling the safety pin, and its collective worth would easily stretch into the hundreds of millions of dollars over the years, yet without the patent Hunt wouldn't make a single penny beyond that initial $400, and he would later die broke.
How much would the safety pin patent be worth today?
Both the $15 debt and the $400 patent might not seem like a lot of money - and certainly compared to what Hunt could have made it isn't - but inflation over the years gives a greater idea of what the inventor was up against.
According to a CPI inflation Calculator, $15 in 1849 - the year that Hunt sold the patent - is the equivalent of around $626.23 in 2025. Conversely, the $400 he got for the safety pin patent would be the equivalent to roughly $16,699.49 today, so you can understand why Hunt might have been ready to part ways with an invention that might not have been as successful as it ended up being.
"If only he was already rich and didn't have that problem," laments one comment underneath Zack D Films' video on the topic, with another adding that "this reminds me of the guy who drew the yellow iconic smile face, dude just got $70 and a pat on the back."