Historical information

A screwdriver is a tool, manual or powered, for turning (driving or removing) screws. A typical simple screwdriver has a handle and a shaft, and a tip that the user inserts into the screw head to turn it. The shaft is usually made of tough steel to resist bending or twisting. The tip may be hardened to resist wear, treated with a dark tip coating for improved visual contrast between tip and screw—or ridged or treated for additional 'grip'. Handle are typically wood, metal, or plastic and usually hexagonal, square, or oval in cross-section to improve grip and prevent the tool from rolling when set down. The handle and shaft of screwdrivers have changed considerably over time. The "Perfect Pattern Handle’ screwdriver was first manufactured by HD Smith & Company, which operated from 1850 to 1900.
Screwdrivers were probably invented in the late 15th century, either in Germany or France when Screws were used to construct screw-cutting lathes, for securing breastplates, backplates, and helmets on medieval jousting armor—and eventually for multiple parts of the emerging firearms, particularly the matchlock. The jaws that hold the pyrites inside medieval guns were secured with screws, and the need to constantly replace the pyrites resulted in considerable refinement of the screwdriver. The screwdriver depended entirely on the screw, and it took several advances to make the screw easy enough to produce to become popular and widespread
Canadian P.L. Robertson, though he was not the first person to patent the idea of socket-head screws, was the first to successfully commercialize them, starting in 1908. In Portland, Oregon, Henry F. Phillips patented his own invention, an improved version of a deep socket with a cruciform slot, today known as the Phillips Screw. Phillips offered his screw to the American Screw Company, and after a successful trial on the 1936 Cadillac, it quickly swept through the American auto industry. A main attraction for the screw was that conventional slotted screwdrivers could also be used on them, which was not possible with the Robertson Screw.

Physical description

A large steel screwdriver with worn wooden handle