ZM's Fletch, Vaughan & Hayley - Fletch, Vaughan & Hayley's Fact of the Day (of the Week!) - Accidental Inventions!

Episode Date: April 23, 2024

On This FOTD(OTW); Vaughan races through a short week of Accidental Inventions!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The ZM Podcast Network. Play ZM's Fletch, Vaughn and Hayley. On today's Fact of the Day of the Week, Vaughn muddles his way through a trio of facts about accidental inventions. It's time for... Fact of the Day, a short week for us You'll see us today You'll see us tomorrow

You'll see us Wednesday Thursday, Friday, November You'll hear us today You'll hear us tomorrow You'll hear us Wednesday Thursday, Friday, no. Well, you'll hear us. Probably say I'll hear us. You'll be seen. Probably say I'll hear us. You'll hear us today. You'll hear us tomorrow. You'll hear us Wednesday. Thursday, Friday, no. It'll be heard.

Yeah. You won't get bit out of us. We're doing that thing a lot of people are doing, making a mega long weekend. Yeah. We're making lemonade out of lemons. I've just been told a little bit of pods will be happening on those days. Oh, of course they will. You will still hear us.

Take back everything I've said. I've just been an absolute idiot. We'll just start again. Start fresh. Three fact of course they will. You will still hear us. Take back everything I've said. I've just been an absolute idiot. We'll just start again. Start fresh. But there'll be three fact of the days this week. The theme this week is accidental discoveries. Oh, good. Accidental inventions.

Good. Let me tell you about Wilson Greatbatch. What a name. Wilson Greatbatch. Wilson Greatbatch. No relation to legendary New Zealand cricketer Mark Greatbatch. Okay. Who I always liked as a kid growing up.

Me too. Because he hit it big. Loved old Greatbatch. And he Who I always liked as a kid growing up. Me too. Because he hit it big. Loved the old Greatbatch. And he had a moustache and he hit it real big. Greatbatch, more like Greatbat. Ting. Ting. So Wilson Greatbatch was an inventor.

He in the 1950s was trying to invent a device to record the rhythm of a human heartbeat. Okay. What was the rhythm? When he heard it was like, this is the rhythm of the heart. The heart. So he was trying to do it.

Now he ran out of, I don't know a lot about electronics, but he ran out of the right sized resistor. That's that little thing when you open it up, it looks like a lolly. Yes. You know the long. And they solder it into the board.

You bet. Into the motherboard or whatever. He was out of the right size resistor, so he put the wrong size resistor in, and he's like, that might work. Okay. Due to this fortuitous accident, I'm going to read this verbatim from this article. The intermittent electrical impulses that the device ended up creating rather than recording because of that final resistor

were very much like the sounds of the human heartbeat. And he, in turn, accidentally invented the pacemaker. Oh my god! Complete accident. Wow! So, then he was like, this is weird because there were pacemakers before that, but

you had to like, they were not portable, they were painful, you had to hook yourself up to this electrical thing that would be like, and go, go, but you had to like, they were not portable. Yeah. They were painful. Yes. You had to hook yourself up to this electrical thing that would be like, and go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, we're going to get this heart going. Right. So then he was like, well, this works.

Tested it first on dogs. Yeah. And then made its way into humans. And your granddad was like one of the test guinea pigs, right? Yeah, my pop was the guinea pig. So each time there'd be a new pacemaker, not the, I think there were a few. And any time they got a new pacemaker, they'd shove it in Garrick and see how it went. And he had all the, so he always had the coolest ones.

Garrick? Wow. Garrick. That's a strong name. That's a bloody great, great name. Wait, so you'd have to have surgery every time? Nah, not every time. Like you'd have them for years, but they don't last forever,

so you do have to get them kind of redone. That's this guy's next invention. Yeah. Was that he said every two years the battery life would die in it. So he invented a lithium-ion battery, which would mean the pacemakers would last for 10 years or more. Yeah. There was a problem in the original design.

It was potentially explosive. So there was a rework later. Okay. But yeah, this one guy invented the mobile pace. My father's got one. Lots of people had them. Incredible. Yeah.

Dad got it and it was just this little cut and they put it in and connected it all up and now it's just got this little bump there. Yeah, it's a little lump under the skin. It's amazing. They're incredible. Amazing invention, and invented completely by mistake.

So today's fact of the day is Wilson Greatbatch was trying to record the sound of the human heart when he accidentally invented the pacemaker. Today's fact of the day, and this short week's fact of the day, things that were invented by mistake. Loving it so far.

Today, we celebrate the slinky. Because everyone loves a slinky. Until it gets a kinky. And then you spend so much time trying to sort it out, and then it gets a bend, and it'll never work again. And then it's got a gap in it. What were they going to be if they weren't put gets abandoned and it'll never work again. And then it will never walk again. What were they going to be if they weren't put down the stairs? Richard T. James.

Shit Springs? Yeah, basically. Richard T. James was an American naval engineer and when he was trying to invent... Any relation to Billy? Billy T. James. No relation that I'm aware of. Maybe a distance.

He worked on board naval vessels and in rough seas he was working with torsion springs to try to get it so fragile equipment wouldn't move. Yeah. Get thrashed around with the boat. Right. Sort of a spring thing. Counterweight. So he dropped

one and it went boing, boing, and walked and he was just like, that was cool. Oh my god so he went into a toy. Yeah so at the end of the war he left him and his wife Betty worked out that you needed

82 foot which is quite a lot of metal and he bought a spring making machine and he wound it like the slinky and went to a local department store and said, Gimbels in Philadelphia and said, I would like you to sell this toy for Christmas.

And they didn't really sell. Oh. Because they just had them sitting there. And he's like, you can't do that. You've got to show people walking down the stairs. So he's like this. And in the middle of like the Christmas shopping, he was like. It was like a movie.

Walked down the stairs, immediately gone. $1 each. Sold out in an hour and a half. Wow. And then, weirdly enough, they've sold like 380 million slinkies around the world. It took off. Everyone loves a slinky. Right.

Goes through generations. I had one. My kids have had one. Like it's still when they're younger. I had a rainbow one. Yeah, the kids had this massive rainbow one. Did he have the rights and the copyright? Well, in 1960, he went to Bolivia to join the Wycliffe,

not Wycliffe Jean, although he- Fugees. He went to join the Fugees, Wycliffe Jean. He didn't. He went to Bolivia to join the Wycliffe Bible Translators, which were like missionary people, got fully into that. Right. And left his wife and children behind when he went

and joined this Christian evangelical sect. Like, cold. Yeah. We're stopping just short of the C word. Cold. He left his wife behind. She's like, bloody hell. Six kids, nearly bankrupt

because Slinky's done their dash at this stage. Betty, his wife, takes over as CEO, moved the company from Philadelphia to Pennsylvania, spent some money on advertising and paid someone to come up with the famous slinky jingle that's been the same since its inception. And she ran the company until she retired in 1998. She was inducted into the-

What happened to the guy in the food cheese? He died of a heart attack in 1974 in Bolivia. Right. While he was still on his- Yeah. When you go to Bolivia, you're partaking. Right. While he was still on his... Yeah. When you're going to Bolivia, you're partaking. I just want to do a little PSA, and this is non-spawn,

but Farmers is currently having a sale that ends tomorrow at $7.99 for a slinky. A metal slinky or a plastic? The metal ones are better. Metal are better because they make the better sound. Yes. Tink, tink. They've got more of a tinky. And is that a legit slinky?

That's the slinky brand as opposed to the springy thing that I've seen on Mighty Ape. Right. Or the large rainbow ring spring ring toy, magical pool ring educational toy on Teemu. That's a hell of a mouthful. That name slinky rolls off the tongue better. Yeah.

Another couple of slinky sub facts. During the Vietnam War, slinkies were used to boost your radio receivership. Oh, yeah. It's a middle. If you were listening to Robin Williams on the radio, Good Morning Vietnam, you would hook it between two trees and then put your radio antenna on. It would act like a bigger antenna. And then it would fold down and take it with you.

Or if you were radioing someone and you were not getting great reception, you'd stretch it out. You'd put one end on your belt with the radio and then the other end on a tree and walk backwards and walk around until you got the... I probably would have just pushed mine down a hill to get rid of all the trip wires and find all the landmines. Yeah, that's good.

Get a shink, shink. Yeah. I don't want to be a... And then the Viet Cong come out of the tunnels because they're like, what is this amazing toy? Yeah. And while they're distracted being like slink, slink, slink, slink.

Pew, pew, pew. Wartime. Lasers. Wartime, baby. It's also the official state toy of Pennsylvania. I didn't even know states had official toys.

That's something I will now look further into. Maybe that's a fact of the day week. Official toys of American states. That's where you do it. I'll stay in my lane. You stay in your lane.

So today's fact in Accidental Invention Week is that the slinky was invented when a naval engineer was trying to invent something to keep instruments safe in rough seas. Play ZM's Fletch, Vaughn and Hayley. We've been talking about accidental inventions this week. Well, you certainly have, Vaughn. invent something to keep instruments safe in rough seas. We've been talking about accidental inventions this week. We certainly have, Vaughn. Yes, we have been. Is it being half week, have you decided this is just a short theme? Just a short one.

Just a short one. I just don't think I could do five more next week. No, we'd like a change. I'd like to change it up, come up with a new theme for next week. Today, did you know... Accidental inventions. The potato chip.

The crisp. An accidental invention. Okay. Ladies and gentlemen, let me take you to the 1850s. Oh my God, good year. We are a great vintage in the 1850s. Great vintage. a good year. We are a great vintage in the 1850s. At a Moon Lake Lodge resort,

a young chef, George Speck, son of an African-American father and Native American mother. That's hot. I'm going to say it. It's already hot. I want to see a picture of this fine looking gentleman. He was working as a cook. One of the dishes

offered at the Moon Lake Lodge was French fried potatoes. Okay. Now those were made then by cutting potatoes lengthwise and lightly frying them. What if it was a really round potato?

It would just still be like slithers or like a scallions. Scallions? Is that what you call it when you make potatoes and they're just like diet, just like- Like scallop potatoes. Scallop, just straight across. Yes. Now, according to the legend,

a customer sent back his French fried potatoes and said, too thick, too soft. Oh. To crunch. Okay. He said, okay, and sliced some thinner potatoes, cooked them again, sent them out to the customer. To the customer said, too thin.

Too thick. Too thick? Too soft. Oh, okay. George is livid by this. Yeah. He's wasting taters. Yeah.

And so he's like, I'll teach this guy. Grabbed a vegetable peeler. Yeah. And peeled the potatoes as thin as he could. Almost transparent. Cooked them almost transparent. Chucked them in the fryer, fried them up until they were crispy and brown, then took them out and put them down.

And the guy was like, perfect. Oh, yum. And he's like, what? And he's like, perfect. This is how I want them. Oh, my God. Wow. And so George is like, oh, God, that mess up.

Someone from the table over is like, what was that crunch? Oh, wow. I simply must have these new chips which were soon called Saratoga chips because you'll remember this lodge is on the side of Lake Saratoga. Never been

myself. Looks beautiful. Upstate New York. Countryside New York. Oh lovely. State not city. So either customer's like oh I simply must have some of these crunchy chips. Sorry what was the customer? I just want to hear what they like, oh, they simply must have some of these crunchy chips. Sorry, what, the customer? I just want to hear what they sounded like. Well, they simply must have some of the crunchy chips. So George is like, okay.

The next night he makes them. These take off. Everybody's all about the Saratoga chips. He then like works out that when you cook them, if you leave them, they kind of last. Yeah. Because they've been deep fried in oil. They'll last for a while.

They take off. This restaurant becomes super popular. And then that's the birth of the crisp, the potato chip as we know it. Wow. Or because some guy was like, I'll show you, you smart ass. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Too bloody thick, too bloody soft. I'll show you. It was Laura Scudder who then created the first modern bag of potato chips in 1953. Ask me how potato chips were taken before that. How were they taken before that? Oh, my God, it's giving a bit of enthusiasm. You'd buy them in wooden boxes

or they'd be scooped from behind glass counters like lollies or like popcorn and put it into a brown bag. That's a great business idea, pick and mix chips. People come into your little shop and you've got little, like an old lolly thing. Scoop of that, scoop of that. Do you know what I hate at a party? When you've got a bag of like sour cream,

like what your snack of chang is, and then someone puts in like the salt and vinegar on top of that. Don't do that. Every bite's a surprise. Halfway down and they fill it up with a different flavoured chip. Get a whole new vessel. A whole new bowl. Every bite's a surprise. No. Oh, I'm into it.

Don't mix chips. You don't mix chips. Wow. Segregate chips. Is that what we're going back to? I don't want to say it. You want to get them their own bathrooms and whatnot? I'm sorry, potato chip.

That's your bathroom over there. You're not allowed to use that one. The sound of the crunching of the potato chip contributes to the pleasure of eating them. There was a study that showed that consumers who ate crisps with headphones on became bored with crisps more quickly. Oh.

And maybe you can hear it inside your brain. It just travels up the... That was actually a very good bit of foley from you. What am I, Reece Darby? Do a gun noise. So today's fact of the day is that potato chips were invented by mistake by a chef who was just getting fed up with a very picky customer. Fact of the day, day, day to rate, review or marry Fletch, Vaughn or Hayley, what one would it be?

Okay, I would marry Hayley. I would have sex. Wait, which one is it? No, no? no no no it's only rate review marry oh okay no comment

I could have sex with the podcast I don't know how that would work give us a sexy little review though ZM's Fletch Vaughan and Hayley