Beer can pull tabs prove that necessity really is the mother of invention

May 27, 2026

Inventor Ermal C. Fraze may not be a household name like Thomas Edison, but he helped create something we all use today: the pull tab that opens drink cans. Before these convenient pop-tops, people typically opened cans with a can opener or through brute force. That included Fraze himself, who forgot his church key — a small tool used to pierce metal lids — while on a family picnic in 1959. Though Fraze managed to open his beer by physically cracking the lid open against his car’s bumper, he remained frustrated by the need to carry a dedicated beverage-opening tool… read more >

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