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in 1921, The 11-year-old Jantzen Knitting Mills obtains a patent for a swimsuit that it advertises in Life and Vogue magazines with the slogan ’The Suit that Changed Bathing to Swimming.’ An Oregon rowing-club member approached Carl Jantzen and his partner more than 5 years ago and asked if they could make him a pair of rowing trunks with an elastic rib stitch. Jantzen has adapted a hosiery knitting machine to make an automated circular machine with a fine needle-bed that produces a stretchable lightweight material at substantially lower cost than other machines [via]