Inventions
Who made the everyday things, and how it usually went sideways first. 23 stories, a few minutes each.
- Bubble Wrap Was Invented as WallpaperIn 1957, two engineers in New Jersey sealed two shower curtains together and created a sheet of plastic filled with air pockets. Alfred Fielding…
- Why Shopping Carts Needed Paid ActorsWhen Sylvan Goldman introduced the first shopping cart at his Humpty Dumpty supermarket in Oklahoma City on June 4, 1937, customers refused to use it.
- Kiruna — The Town That MovedKiruna, Sweden's northernmost city, sits 145 kilometers above the Arctic Circle on top of one of the largest and purest iron ore deposits on Earth.…
- How Velcro Was Inspired by BurrsIn 1941, Swiss engineer George de Mestral took his Irish pointer for a walk through the woods near the Alps. When they returned home, both man and…
- The Great Stink of LondonIn the summer of 1858, the River Thames smelled so bad that Parliament considered relocating.
- How the Microwave Oven Was Accidentally InventedIn 1945, a self-taught engineer named Percy Spencer was walking through a radar testing room at Raytheon when he noticed the chocolate bar in his…
- The Antikythera MechanismIn 1901, sponge divers exploring a shipwreck near the Greek island of Antikythera pulled up a corroded lump of bronze. For decades, it sat in a…
- How Post-it Notes Were Accidentally InventedIn 1968, Spencer Silver, a chemist at 3M, was trying to develop a super-strong adhesive for the aerospace industry. He failed.
- Why Manhole Covers Are RoundFor decades, one question haunted job interviews at Microsoft, Google, and countless other tech companies: why are manhole covers round?
- The Winchester Mystery HouseSarah Winchester inherited a fortune built on rifles. Her husband William had been heir to the Winchester Repeating Arms Company, maker of "the gun…
- The Svalbard Global Seed VaultOn a remote island in the Norwegian Arctic, about 620 miles from the North Pole, there's a concrete entrance jutting out of a mountainside. Behind…
- Why We Use QWERTY KeyboardsThe layout of your keyboard was designed in the 1870s to solve a mechanical problem that no longer exists.
- How the Slinky Was Accidentally InventedIn 1943, Richard James was a naval engineer at the William Cramp & Sons shipyards in Philadelphia, working on a problem that had nothing to do with…
- Leap SecondsThe Earth is slowing down. It has been for billions of years.
- Murphy's LawThere was a real Murphy. His name was Edward A. Murphy Jr., a captain in the U.S. Air Force, and the law that bears his name originated from a 1949…
- How Traffic Lights Were Invented Before CarsThe first traffic light was installed outside the Houses of Parliament in London on December 10, 1868—more than a decade before Karl Benz patented…
- How the Guillotine Was Designed to Be HumaneBefore the French Revolution, the method of execution in France depended on social class. Nobles were beheaded by sword, a relatively quick death…
- How Elevators Changed ArchitectureBefore the elevator, the most desirable floor in any building was the first.
- How Aspirin Was Discovered TwiceWillow bark has been used as a pain remedy for thousands of years.
- The Bridge That Soldiers Must Break Step OnOn April 12, 1831, a column of the 60th Rifle Corps marched across Broughton Suspension Bridge near Manchester, England.
- The Inventor Killed by His Own InventionOn February 4, 1912, Franz Reichelt climbed to the first platform of the Eiffel Tower and jumped. He was wearing a combination overcoat-parachute…
- Hedy LamarrHedy Lamarr was one of the biggest movie stars of the 1940s. She was also the co-inventor of a frequency-hopping communication system that laid the…
- The Invention of the ZipperThe zipper took more than forty years and three inventors to get right, which is remarkable given how simple the finished product looks. Its…