Stuff You Should Know - Short Stuff: Magic 8 Ball

Episode Date: January 28, 2026

The Magic 8 Ball, the mystical fortune telling pool ball started out as a piece of customer swag for the Brunswick Billiard Company.  Since then, it has changed the course of history and shaped nations.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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can lead to amazing discoveries Listen to Adventures of Curiosity Cove every Monday from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, and welcome to The Short Stuff. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck, and Jerry's here sitting in for Dave. This is Short Stuff, and we're talking about the magic eight ball. Probably know what that is. We have one in our house, you know. It's kind of one of those toys that I think most Gen Xers, and actually knowing how to be, how old it is, probably boomers bought for Gen Xers, and now Gen Xers are buying for their alphas and Zimmers and I don't know where millennials got left out. But this is the classic toy.

I assume most people have seen this, but in other countries you may not know what we're talking about, but it is essentially a, looks like a billiards ball. It's about the size of a, maybe a grapefruit. and it's got a little flat side on, let's say, the bottom. And in that side, it's got a little clear window with some dark liquid. And floating in that liquid is a 20-sided die with a bunch of answers to yes or no questions, with the idea being that you ask it a question, you shake this thing up, and then you see what the answer tells you.

Very simple. That's it. And it is very simple, but I think that's the key. with a lot of stuff that just becomes a part of pop culture. Yes, totally. There's not much to it, but just something about it comes together and makes everybody love it. And the Magic 8 Ball is no difference. Definitely one of the more successful toys to come out of the 20th century.

And it dates back as far back as the 40s, as a matter of fact, or actually the early 50s, but the story begins further back than that. Because there was a prototype that was created by a man named Albert Carter. and he was brothers-in-law with a guy named Abe Bookman, and both of them together helped found the company that would eventually go on to create Magic 8 Balls, basically based on Carter's idea that he got from his mom. Yeah, it's a pretty cool story.

So his mom was a self-proclaimed, clairvoyant, and very popular at the time in Cincinnati during the age of spiritualism and used spiritual writing or psychic writing device to communicate with the beyond, supposedly. And Carter was like, Mom, you're the best, you're so cool. During World War II, he built a prototype of a toy, sort of in honor of what she was doing, that he called at first the Psycho-C-E-R, S-Y-C-O-S-E-R, which was essentially what's inside of the Magic 8-ball now.

It was a tube divided in half, and each side has that dark liquid, and each side had a dye, and you would turn it one side up or the other side up to see what it said. Yeah. So there's the basis of the magic apeal right there because that's essentially what a magic apeal is today. Yeah. So Carter went around and he's like, he's showing it to local stores in Cincinnati and he hits upon one that's like, I love these. I want a bunch of them. Not only do I want to sell them in my store, I want to start distributing these.

Let's do it. Carter had big time struggles with alcoholism from what I've read. So he's like, I have no idea how to make anything mass produced. I just have good ideas. So he turned to his brother, A. Bookman, who was the kind of person who could get things done. And they formed a partnership. Bookman apparently had a – they were close, as brothers-in-law could be. I think Bookman kind of had almost like a caretaker heart for Carter.

He said when he was sober, he was a genius. He was always broke. I bought every idea he ever had, and that gave him enough money to keep going. So when Carter turns the bookman says, I've got this really good idea, but I have no idea how to fulfill any orders. Can you help me? Like I said, they formed a partnership. That's right. Carter got the patent, and they named it Psycho-Seer, colon, the Miracle Home Fortune Teller.

A few years later, they modified it a bit to basically made it smaller, it sounds like. Yeah. And then called it the Psychoslate, colon, the Pocket Fortuitary. Orchinteller, colon, we can't get it any smaller, everybody. So don't ask. And then in 1946, they formed a novelty company named Allabe Crafts from Albert and Abe, their names. And very sadly, I imagine probably somewhat due to the life he was living, living. Carter died, and Abe was the sole owner of the company.

And maybe that's a good cliffhanger to see what happens next. I think it's perfect. All right. We're going to take a break. We'll be right back. So where we left off, Albert Carter died, sadly, and A. Bookman was running the company, and he continued making novelties. And somewhere along the line, the Psycho-Seer caught the attention of the Brunswick Billiard Company out of Chicago. They make pool tables. They make bumper bowling balls. And in 1950, they went to Bookman and said, hey, this Psycho-Seer thing's awesome. but can you like make it into an eight ball? And Bookman was like,

you're talking about the billiard version of the ape ball, right? And they were like, yes, yes. We don't even know what you're talking about at this point. And so he said, I think I can do that. And he got busy making, taking essentially the psychoseer and building a plastic ape all around it. That's right. Pretty good idea.

This time it just has the one die. You know, you didn't need to have two sides because you just had the one window. I never knew it was 20-sided. When I read that, I was like, that's got to be a misprint. There's no more than 10 answers on that thing. No. But I'm wrong.

There are 10 affirmative answers. And, of course, if you've played it, you'll recognize these. If not, it says things like it is certain or outlook good. There are five negative answers ranging from outlook not so good to my sources say no and don't count on it. Yeah. And five non-committal answers like hazy, try again, ask again, later. And the idea, everybody, is that you're having a slumber party and you're asking if this boy or this girl thinks you're cute or something. I mean, that's generally what it's used for.

Like, people don't really consult it for like big life decisions. But if you're a kid, that's kind of what we were like, you know, we were doing with it. If you're on TV in a sitcom or a movie, then you might consult it for a big life decision. But yes. Yeah, sure. I would guess the average person wouldn't do that, right? No, you just want to find out if somebody's crushing on you. So, and then after that, it's light as feathers, stiff as a board. That's right, because your sources said no, so what else is there to do? So Brunswick customers love this stuff.

I'm guessing these are like wholesalers, retailers of billiard tables, that kind of thing. And they're like, I love this. Thank you so much, Brunswick. I'll be a customer forever. And so Abe Bookman was like, I'm just going to start making these for the general public and sell them. And initially he said, you know what this is? It's a great paperweight. Yeah.

And he sold them as a novelty paperweight for adults, which is a really niche item. And it was not necessarily the best business move. Yeah, it's funny. I feel like there are a lot of stories like that where the thing that ended up being a huge hit, they initially were just so way off in what they thought people were going to like about it. Right. You know? Yeah.

And that's a great example of it. Yeah. That new Coke? Yeah, new Coke for sure. And they quickly became part of pop culture once he realized that teens love these things. They started to buy them and he said, oh, I missed on what everyone, like, this is clearly a toy. And teens have slumber parties and want to know if people are crushing on them. So I'm going to make a million bucks selling these things.

And he did. He made many millions of bucks, I imagine. Yeah, apparently they sell a million. million a year reliably. If you own the Magic Apeball rights, you can expect to sell a million of them a year every year. That's awesome. Let's get those rights. Yeah. So you said they're part of pop culture, and I mentioned that sometimes on movies and TV, people will consult them for big life decisions. That's called a McGuffin. That means that Magic A Ball is a MacGuffin, Chuck. I think you should explain it because you're the movie guy. I don't even know how to best describe a McGuffin. I mean, I think it's something that of low import in reality but has high import as far as what it means in the film.

Is that about right? Yeah, it moves the plot along. Yeah, it's not a fake thing, but it's not like you actually found the plans or the treasure map. You know, a treasure map wouldn't be a MacGuffin unless the treasure didn't end up being a treasure, and it's just what brought you to the place to meet the girl. Does that make sense? No. You just chandled me.

No, no, no, I think I got it. Okay. If there's a treasure map and it leads to the treasure, then that thing isn't a MacGuffin. That's a real deal, like a plot piece or whatever. Okay. But if that treasure map leads you to Brazil, and there is a thing. no treasure at all, but what really happens in Brazil is X, Y, and Z, then the treasure map would have been a MacGuffin. But then does the stuff that happens in Brazil, the X, Y, and Z you

referred to, is that what the movie's actually about? Yeah, yeah. Okay, so that's not like a boondoggle or anything like that. Oh, see, now I don't even know what's a boondoggle. A boondoggle would be if the treasure map led to Brazil and X, Y, and Z happening, but that was a detour. were really the movie's about getting to the treasure. Oh, okay. Are we talking about romancing the stone? I think inevitably we just kind of fell into that. That was Cartagena, though.

It was. It wasn't Brazil. Cartagena, Columbia. Yeah, that movie really holds up, by the way. I know. I saw it not too long ago. You told me you showed it to Ruby, and she liked it too much. Yeah, that's right.

I talked about this. So fun. So, yeah, that's a MacGuffin. And back to the magic baseball. I guess it is. There's a really great use of it. I guess it would be a MacGuffin in The Simpsons from 1992. I think it's Bart's friend falls in love where Bart and Milhouse are on the bus at the beginning,

and they're asking the Magic Aipal how long they'll be friends. And after a series of questions, they find out that the Magic Aipal tells them their friendship will be over by the end of that day. And it turns out some new girl comes to school, captures Milhouse's heart, and Bart starts to get jealous that Millhouse is distracted from him and their friendship because of some girl. And they end up getting in a fight and Bart strikes Millhouse with the magic apeal later on in the tree house. I think I remember that one. It's a great one. Also, by the way, I know we could have looked up the definition of McGuffin.

But I think that was a little more fun. We've been getting some flack lately on not looking at pronunciations. Oh, yeah? Yeah, a little bit here and there. I think some snarky guy on Instagram was bagging on on you because of Navidia. apparently it's Invidia Yeah

Oh and also we got Taking the test for Tagalog Yeah You know Sorry Yeah And also like When you spell something

NV dot dot dot It's a little confusing Sure we could have looked it up But I don't know That's just not our style Yeah plus I was confused I thought we were talking about Nivia The skincare brand

Oh see That sponsors the ball drop in time squares They're also a chipmaker, I imagine. That's actually Mvia. Is short stuff out? Oh, yeah, I guess so. All right. Stuff you should know is a production of IHeartRadio.

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