Post it Notes
Slinky
Potato Chips
Corn Flakes
The Kellogg Company has been feeding America for over a century. The popular cereal was accidentally invented by the Kellogg brothers, Dr. John Harvey and Will Keith. One day, the two Adventists brothers (the Seven Day Adventist church is known for its emphasis on vegetarian diet and holistic health) went searching for wholesome foods to feed the strict vegetarian Adventists patients at the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan, where Dr. John Harvey Kellogg was superintendent in 1894. When they returned to the Sanitarium, they found stale the boiled wheat that Will had accidentally left sitting on the table, and not wanting to throw it away, they decided to put it through rollers and make a sheet of dough. They got flakes instead, which they toasted and served to the patients who loved them. They patented their invention under the name Granose, and the two brothers went on to experiment with other grains, including corn. In 1906 Will created the Kellogg Company, which John refused to join on principal because Will added sugar to the grains, thereby reducing their healthy benefits.
Saccharin
If researcher Constantine Fahlberg had remembered to wash his hands before eating, he wouldn’t have discovered Saccharin, the oldest artificial sweetener. In 1879 Fahlberg was working at Johns Hopkins University in the laboratory of Professor Ira Remsen, where one day he spilled a chemical on his hands which he forgot to wash before sitting down to eat his lunch. The chemical caused the bread he ate to taste unusually sweet. The two scientists published their discovery in 1880, and in 1884, Fahlberg, who decided proceed without Remsen, obtained a patent and began mass-producing saccharin. Saccharin became widespread during World War I, when sugar was rationed and became very popular during the 1960s and 1970s with the manufacture of Sweet'N Low and diet soft drinks.
Microwave Ovens
Fireworks are today part of national and other celebrations around the world. Their history began in China during the Hun Dynasty (200 B.C.) long before the invention of the gunpowder. The first 'Fireworks' were green pieces of bamboo, which exploded unexpectedly when someone accidentally threw them onto the fire. This is because bamboo grows so quickly thereby trapping air in its cavities, which expands and breaks the bamboo with a loud noise when is heated. Because the noise frightened people and animals, the Chinese concluded that it can also frighten and drive away evil spirits, so they began to throw green bamboo in the fire during the New Year to scare away the evil spirit of Nian and to ensure happiness and prosperity for the New Year. Later, the custom expanded to other celebrations such as births, weddings and coronations. The pao chuk, as the Chinese called the bursting green bamboo, continued to be used until gunpowder was discovered which the Chinese used to create a variety of explosives and fireworks.
Post-it Notes
Today, about 6,005,000,000 Post-it notes, the small pieces of paper with a strip of low-tack adhesive on the back that can be attached temporarily to just about anything, are sold in more than 100 countries. However, in 1968, Dr. Spencer Silver, a chemist at 3M Company in the U.S., failed when he tried to promote the low-tack, reusable and pressure sensitive adhesive he invented. In 1974, Art Fry, a colleague of Silver, came up with the idea of using the adhesive to anchor his bookmark in his hymnbook. It took 3M 3 years to adopt Fry’s idea and to launch the product, under the name ‘Press 'n Peel’, in stores. The results were disappointing and a year later, 3M issued free samples to residents of Boise, Idaho, who said in their majority that they would buy the product. In 1980, the product debuted in US stores under the name "Post-It Notes, and in 1981 the product was launched in Canada and Europe. However, the Post-it notes are more than stationery. In 2001, Rebecca Murtaugh, a California artist, created a structure by covering her entire bedroom with $1000 worth of Post- it notes, using the ordinary yellow Post-it notes for objects that had less value to her, and neon colours Post-it notes for more important objects. In 2002, Jésica López of Monterrey, Mexico, began painting a series of figures and portraits in acrylic on Post-it notes to portray the faces of '101 Most Powerful Women ', which were recognized in the Forbes list of 2006. In 2000, the 20th Anniversary of Post-it notes was celebrated by artists who created works of art on Post-it notes. One such art piece, by artist RB Kitaj, was sold for £ 640 at auction, making it the most valuable Post-it note on record.
Many of us associate the smell of Play-Doh with our childhood. The
brightly-coloured non-toxic, non-staining, reusable modeling clay was invented as
pliable putty wallpaper cleaner in 1955, by Joseph and Noah McVicker for Kutol
Products. When it was discovered that the wallpaper cleaner was being used by nursery
school children for making Christmas ornaments, the McVickers took their
Play-Doh to an educational convention for manufacturers of school supplies and soon
the Woodward & Lothrop Department store in Washington began to sell the clay. The McVickers formed
the Rainbow Crafts Company in Cincinnati, Ohio to make and sell Play-Doh and it
has since then sold 700 million pounds. The recipe for making it still remains
a secret.
It bounces, it stretches, and it breaks and is a lot of fun. Silly Putty bounced into the market 60 years ago and about 4,500 tons of the silicone-based plastic clay have been sold since it was introduced on the market as a children's toy by Binney & Smith, Inc. It was discovered during World War II, by James Wright who dropped boric acid into silicone oil while he was attempting to create a substitute for synthetic rubber. It took until 1950 to find a use for the polymerized substance in which the marketing expert Peter Hodgson saw the potential for a toy. The product was renamed Silly Putty, and the fun classic toy was born. In addition to being fun, Silly Putty can be used to pick up dirt, lint, and pet hair, to stabilize wobbly furniture and to reduce stress. The crew of Apollo 8 even used it to secure tools in zero gravity.
Slinky
The Slinky or ‘Lazy Spring’ is a helical spring toy that stretches and re-coils by gravity and by its own momentum. The idea for the toy came to Richard James, a naval mechanic engineer who in 1943 was trying to develop a spring that would support and stabilize sensitive instruments on ships in rough seas, when he knocked off the shelf one of the springs he was using, which continued to move, climbing down from book to book until it ended on floor, where it re-coiled and stopped in an upright position. James’s wife Betty named the toy Slinky (sleek and graceful), and with a $ 5oo loan, the James formed the James Industries in Philadelphia to manufacture Slinky. When it made its debut in 1945, 400 toys were sold in 90 minutes. Later, several related toys were made such as the Slinky Dog, the Slinky train Loco, the Slinky worm Suzie, and the Slinky Crazy Eyes, a pair of glasses that uses Slinkys over the eyeholes which are attached to plastic eyeballs. Today, more than 250 million Slinkys have been sold worldwide.
Betty James explained the toy's success to the Associated Press in 1995 by saying, ‘It's the simplicity of it’.
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