Editing Flexagon (section)

== History ==
=== Discovery and introduction of the hexaflexagon ===
The discovery of the first flexagon, a trihexaflexagon, is credited to the British mathematician [[Arthur Harold Stone|Arthur H. Stone]], while a student at [[Princeton University]] in the United States in 1939. His new American paper would not fit in his English binder so he cut off the ends of the paper and began folding them into different shapes.<ref name="Gardner1956">{{cite magazine |title=Flexagons |magazine=[[Scientific American]] |first=Martin |last=Gardner |volume=195 |issue=6 |pages=162–168 |date=December 1956 |doi=10.1038/scientificamerican1256-162 |oclc=4657622161|jstor=24941843}}</ref> One of these formed a trihexaflexagon. Stone's colleagues [[Bryant Tuckerman]], [[Richard Feynman]], and [[John Tukey]] became interested in the idea and formed the Princeton Flexagon Committee. Tuckerman worked out a [[topology|topological]] method, called the Tuckerman traverse, for revealing all the faces of a flexagon.<ref name="Gardner1988">{{cite book |title=Hexaflexagons and Other Mathematical Diversions: The First Scientific American Book of Puzzles and Games |publisher=University of Chicago Press |first=Martin |last=Gardner |year=1988 |isbn=0-226-28254-6}}</ref> Tuckerman traverses are shown as a diagram that maps each face of the flexagon to each other face.  In doing so, he realized that each face does not always appear in the same state.

Flexagons were introduced to the general public by [[Martin Gardner]] in the December 1956 issue of ''[[Scientific American]]'' in an article so well-received that it launched Gardner's [[Mathematical Games column|"Mathematical Games" column]] which then ran in that magazine for the next twenty-five years.<ref name="Gardner1956"/><ref>{{cite web |url=https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/the-top-10-martin-gardner-scientific-american-articles/ |title=The Top 10 Martin Gardner Scientific American Articles |work=Scientific American |first=Colm |last=Mulcahy |date=October 21, 2014}}</ref> In 1974, the magician [[Doug Henning]] included a construct-your-own hexaflexagon with the original cast recording of his Broadway show ''[[The Magic Show]]''.

=== Attempted commercial development ===
In 1955, Russell Rogers and Leonard D'Andrea of [[Homestead, Pennsylvania|Homestead Park, Pennsylvania]] applied for a patent, and in 1959 they were granted U.S. Patent number 2,883,195 for the hexahexaflexagon, under the title "Changeable Amusement Devices and the Like."

Their patent imagined possible applications of the device "as a toy, as an advertising display device, or as an educational geometric device."<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.freepatentsonline.com/2883195.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110614011049/http://www.freepatentsonline.com/2883195.pdf |archive-date=2011-06-14 |url-status=live |title=Changeable amusement devices and the like |website=Freepatentsonline.com |first1=Russell E. |last1=Rogers |first2=Leonard D. L. |last2=Andrea |id=U.S. Patent 2883195 |date=April 21, 1959 |access-date=January 13, 2011}}</ref> A few such novelties were produced by the [[Herbick & Held Printing Company]], the printing company in [[Pittsburgh]] where Rogers worked, but the device, marketed as the "Hexmo", failed to catch on.