Production model for a white colored JogBra with nylon straps with a heavy zigzag stitch throughout and a wide elastic band at the bottom. There is a nylon label sewn onto the front of the elastic band that serves as a key holder.
Lisa Lindahl, Hinda Miller, and Polly Palmer Smith, made their prototype of the jogbra from a pair of men's jock straps in the Costume Department at the University of Vermont. Lindahl started the company Jogbra, Inc. in 1977 and then re-named it SLS, Inc. (for Smith, Lindahl, Schreiber) in early 1978. The name changed again to Jogbra Inc., for a brief time, before finally becoming JBI, Inc. in the early 1980s. JBI, Inc. was bought by Playtex Apparel, Inc. in 1990. Playtex Apparel was sold to the Sara Lee Corporation in 1991. Lindahl, Miller, and Smith received US Patent 4,174,717 for an athletic brassiere on November 20, 1979. The Jogbra was the first example of the garments now known generally as sports bras, an industry that has grown in direct proportion to the increased participation of women in athletics generally since 1977. Lisa Lindahl originally wanted to solve the problem of having sore breasts after running, resulting in the invention of the jog bra which has evolved into the sports bra as we know it today.
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