WEBVTT - Selects: Waterbeds: The Sexiest Bed? 0:00:00.680 --> 0:00:04.960 Hello everyone. It's Chuck here on a Saturday, and today's 0:00:05.040 --> 0:00:09.920 select episode is called water Beds Colan the Sexiest bed 0:00:10.480 --> 0:00:14.960 Oh me thinks, yes, indeed, this episode is from October, 0:00:16.960 --> 0:00:26.400 also the sexiest month. Check it out now. Water Beds. 0:00:26.440 --> 0:00:29.240 Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I 0:00:29.320 --> 0:00:39.320 Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, 0:00:39.360 --> 0:00:42.040 and there's Charles w Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry over there, 0:00:42.040 --> 0:00:46.000 and we're just here jiggling away slash slash on our 0:00:46.120 --> 0:00:50.960 pleasure pit. God oh man, it's so funny. When I 0:00:50.960 --> 0:00:54.120 started researching and so I was like, water beds, that's 0:00:54.280 --> 0:00:57.320 very stuff you should know. So sort of fits right 0:00:57.360 --> 0:01:07.480 in with our historical pop culture phenomena series. Phenomenal uh 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:09.600 and big shout out to The Atlantic, one of our 0:01:09.600 --> 0:01:13.520 favorite rags. A lot of this was taken from article 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:16.880 by Rebecca Greenfield. Uh, and then a bunch of other 0:01:16.920 --> 0:01:21.000 cool uh supplementary stuff. New York Times, who else? Uh? 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:26.240 Washington Post, Washington Yeah, wap open all those fake news outlets, right, 0:01:26.760 --> 0:01:29.000 although I really love the New York Times and the 0:01:29.000 --> 0:01:32.160 Washington Post ones because they were like contemporary articles. Yeah, 0:01:32.560 --> 0:01:36.080 like the New York Times one was six and Wapo 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:40.959 was from and they're writing about the phenomena of of 0:01:41.280 --> 0:01:44.440 um water beds at the time. I love that, man. 0:01:44.480 --> 0:01:47.039 I love being able to go back read an article 0:01:47.600 --> 0:01:50.360 and then go back and see how it actually unraveled, 0:01:50.400 --> 0:01:55.640 like in real time. Basically, yes, see, like sure, it's 0:01:55.640 --> 0:01:58.840 a little time capsule if you will, and you can 0:01:58.840 --> 0:02:01.920 look back now and say, they get it right. What's 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:05.840 the big news? I don't even like saying this two 0:02:05.840 --> 0:02:09.360 words together. I know neither so played out, so played 0:02:10.040 --> 0:02:12.800 All right, let's talk about the water bed. Have you 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:18.160 ever had one? No, I kind of wanted one. I 0:02:18.200 --> 0:02:21.400 didn't have one. I kind of wanted one to. I 0:02:21.400 --> 0:02:24.040 think we're just of that age and they came about, 0:02:24.040 --> 0:02:26.240 as you'll see, we're gonna talking about the seventies and eighties. 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:29.600 That in the eighties is when they peaked sales wise. 0:02:30.280 --> 0:02:33.880 I think even like young uns like us, we're very intrigued. 0:02:34.680 --> 0:02:37.720 Oh yeah, my friend had one. Yeah, did you sleep 0:02:37.760 --> 0:02:40.400 on it? No, never slept on that one. I laid 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:42.480 down on it once, I think because I was I 0:02:42.560 --> 0:02:44.000 was like, I gotta know what this feels like at 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:48.640 least uh, And I think it was. They may have 0:02:48.760 --> 0:02:52.040 called it waveless, but I don't even know what the 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:55.680 difference was because it was pretty wavy. What decade was this, 0:02:55.680 --> 0:02:58.320 This would have been mid to late eighties. Yeah, I 0:02:58.400 --> 0:03:01.040 don't even they had waveless ones back then. I think 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:03.800 so they were called waveless, but I don't know how 0:03:03.960 --> 0:03:07.720 it's still slashed you around. Yeah, I remember very distinctively 0:03:07.800 --> 0:03:10.920 laying on it, and I remember thinking, I don't know 0:03:10.960 --> 0:03:14.079 if I could sleep on this. It didn't seem like 0:03:14.520 --> 0:03:16.960 I mean, it wasn't uncomfortable like it caused me pain, 0:03:17.880 --> 0:03:23.600 but I move around a lot in my sleep, so 0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:25.280 it's not It's not a good or at least the 0:03:25.320 --> 0:03:27.320 old school water beds are not a good match for me. 0:03:28.720 --> 0:03:31.560 Memory phone is a little better. Actually, supposedly they've come 0:03:31.600 --> 0:03:34.840 a long way, and then the new water beds are 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:38.200 the bomb. I would be curious to lay on one. Well, 0:03:38.440 --> 0:03:40.640 go to a dealer in South Florida. I think City 0:03:40.640 --> 0:03:43.400 Furniture in South Florida is bringing back the water bed. 0:03:43.760 --> 0:03:46.440 Oh there's other places too, because the design now, well 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:48.160 we'll get to it, but it's much different. It's not 0:03:48.640 --> 0:03:50.280 it's not the good old days where you just fill 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:56.000 up a big vinyl rubber bladder and tripping on some 0:03:56.080 --> 0:03:59.360 grass and listening to Dark Side of the Moon. You know. 0:03:59.480 --> 0:04:01.600 The funny thing about my friend Chris's water bed, though, 0:04:01.840 --> 0:04:04.920 in his whole house was a time capsule of the 0:04:05.000 --> 0:04:09.160 nineteen seventies. He had a water bed in front of 0:04:09.200 --> 0:04:13.920 a wall that the wall was a photograph of a 0:04:14.120 --> 0:04:17.200 like a Hawaiian beach sunset. Oh man, we had two 0:04:17.240 --> 0:04:20.560 of those in my house. Really. We had one was 0:04:20.600 --> 0:04:23.480 a straight up forest. So I was like, oh, I'm 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:25.560 in the family room. I'll walk into the kitchen. Oh 0:04:25.560 --> 0:04:28.360 my god, I'm in the forest basically. And then if 0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:32.680 you went upstairs, and this is my childhood home in Toledo, Ohio, Um, 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:37.240 when you went upstairs to my sister's rooms, you when 0:04:37.279 --> 0:04:39.560 you got right up to the top landing, there was 0:04:39.600 --> 0:04:43.279 like an outdoor like Coors beer scene, like in the 0:04:43.320 --> 0:04:47.120 woods with like a stream coming through the mountains. Giant murals. 0:04:47.400 --> 0:04:51.240 In my house. Yeah, we never It's weird. Like when 0:04:51.240 --> 0:04:52.760 I look back at the house I grew up in, 0:04:53.279 --> 0:04:56.479 it didn't have any of those cool seventies things. But 0:04:56.560 --> 0:04:58.960 now that I look back, I think it's probably you know, 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:03.000 I was not cool then because we lived in this 0:05:03.120 --> 0:05:05.360 huge house in the woods. But now I look back, 0:05:05.360 --> 0:05:07.320 I'm like, that was where I would like to live now, 0:05:07.440 --> 0:05:11.040 So what was the aesthetic of your house? Sort of 0:05:11.720 --> 0:05:16.400 contempo country Okay, like that hip like Jerry Read or 0:05:16.440 --> 0:05:19.200 something lived there. Yeah, I mean we had looking back, 0:05:19.240 --> 0:05:22.160 we had shag carpet, range, shag carpet. There were some 0:05:22.240 --> 0:05:25.479 markings of the day. Um. But then that was replaced 0:05:25.520 --> 0:05:29.760 with hardwoods at some point in the in the eighties. Um. 0:05:29.800 --> 0:05:32.159 But then when I had, you know, not too long ago, 0:05:32.200 --> 0:05:34.640 went back to my childhood home and broke in. It 0:05:34.720 --> 0:05:39.680 was for sale really and empty, and uh you broke in? Well, 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:42.440 not for sale, it was just sort of derelict and empty. 0:05:42.480 --> 0:05:44.560 Did you break a window to break in? Now? I 0:05:44.600 --> 0:05:46.760 just got in like I used to get in. It 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:48.880 was family was like it's locked, and I was like 0:05:49.160 --> 0:05:52.839 watch this. I used to sneak out and read Bible passages, 0:05:53.560 --> 0:05:56.960 so I snuck in through the garage window. And looking back, 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:58.400 there was a lot of a lot of the same 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:00.920 stuff was there, and it was very kind of seventies 0:06:00.960 --> 0:06:04.279 tile and linoleum and stuff like that, but it just 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:09.000 wasn't full on like Brady Bunch stuff. That's so cool 0:06:09.120 --> 0:06:11.279 more or wall murals, and I'm glad I went because 0:06:11.680 --> 0:06:14.960 sadly it is no longer there. I'm glad you went to. 0:06:15.080 --> 0:06:18.200 Then a couple of months later just torn down, and 0:06:18.279 --> 0:06:21.440 I went back and saw a big emptiness, and I cried, 0:06:22.040 --> 0:06:25.600 did you the end? I could see that, you mean? 0:06:25.640 --> 0:06:27.920 And I went to Toledo and then I since went once. 0:06:28.000 --> 0:06:31.400 When we went to Cleveland for our show, I went 0:06:31.480 --> 0:06:34.880 by myself and walked around, kind of hoping that the 0:06:34.880 --> 0:06:36.440 people who live in the house would be like, what's 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:38.400 that weird of doing and stick their head out and 0:06:38.400 --> 0:06:40.680 be like can I help you? And I'd be like, yeah, actually, 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:43.279 can I come in your house? Um? But no one did. 0:06:43.640 --> 0:06:45.600 But I did get to walk around the neighborhood. Did 0:06:45.640 --> 0:06:49.200 you cry a little nice? But I I saw. I 0:06:49.240 --> 0:06:51.680 wanted to go back to my elementary school, and it's 0:06:51.760 --> 0:06:54.240 just like a grass field now. Man, It's like, how 0:06:54.240 --> 0:06:56.839 do you tear down an elementary school? You know? Yeah, 0:06:57.000 --> 0:07:00.760 maybe it got like black mold or something, well tube, 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:04.440 but it's it's sweet. It's better sweet to go back. Yeah, 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:07.799 go back to your childhood places. Everyone. I highly highly 0:07:07.839 --> 0:07:13.200 recommended so water bed Yeah, water beds Um, we'll go 0:07:13.280 --> 0:07:15.960 back to the earliest history, I guess. But um, the 0:07:16.000 --> 0:07:18.400 man that we really need to talk about is a 0:07:18.400 --> 0:07:22.480 man named Charles Hall, the inventor of the modern water 0:07:22.560 --> 0:07:27.360 bed as we know it. He's a student at San 0:07:27.400 --> 0:07:31.080 Francisco State. He's taking a design class. Oh he was 0:07:31.120 --> 0:07:33.880 like a design major. Well, yeah, because he submitted this 0:07:34.000 --> 0:07:37.560 as his master's thesis, was the waterbed. How awesome is that? 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:41.920 So I saw competing stuff of what he actually created 0:07:42.320 --> 0:07:45.280 like built, yeah. Yeah. And the thing that I saw, 0:07:45.400 --> 0:07:50.400 I think it was in that WAPO It said what 0:07:50.440 --> 0:07:53.280 he created was called the pleasure pit, and it was 0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:57.000 an eight foot by eight foot basically water bed tub 0:07:57.080 --> 0:07:59.280 of pudding, but it was meant to be a conversation 0:07:59.320 --> 0:08:01.760 pit from mold pull people that kind of hang around 0:08:01.800 --> 0:08:03.920 in and there was like a bar and there was 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:07.920 lighting and like shelves and stuff like that, and that 0:08:07.920 --> 0:08:12.760 that was the original his design. Yeah. But was there 0:08:12.800 --> 0:08:16.360 a water mattress function or was it just a sunken 0:08:16.640 --> 0:08:19.000 going room. No, that was the thing that was where 0:08:19.040 --> 0:08:21.480 everybody sat was on a water mattress in the middle. 0:08:21.520 --> 0:08:24.320 It sounds awful, it's just weird, but it really caught 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:28.040 everybody's imagination. Supposedly, within six months it was on the 0:08:28.080 --> 0:08:31.040 front page of papers across the country. This is in 0:08:31.080 --> 0:08:35.240 San Francisco. The Miami Herald had something on the front 0:08:35.240 --> 0:08:39.400 page about this waterbed exhibit in San Francisco that this 0:08:40.120 --> 0:08:43.719 four year old design student created capital p capital p 0:08:45.440 --> 0:08:48.679 uh yeah, pleasure pit. Everything I've seen is it's capitalized. 0:08:48.760 --> 0:08:50.120 But that's what I'm saying. I think that's what he 0:08:50.200 --> 0:08:53.760 called the first thing. But it very quickly got turned 0:08:53.760 --> 0:08:57.720 into a bed. The water bed I used to like. Actually, 0:08:57.760 --> 0:09:00.960 my same friend Chris had one of those sunken living 0:09:01.040 --> 0:09:07.719 rooms very seventies. Remember in um, oh, what's the big 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:10.679 Lebowski when you go see to see Jackie Child or 0:09:10.760 --> 0:09:14.280 Jackie whatever. Jackie Treehorn. Yeah, Jackie Treehorn. His whole house 0:09:14.400 --> 0:09:19.480 is just amazing. Yeah. He had a conversation pit. Uh right, 0:09:19.600 --> 0:09:23.240 conversation pit, that's what it was called. So here's the 0:09:23.280 --> 0:09:29.160 deal from Time magazine. In Manhattan, the waterbed display at 0:09:29.160 --> 0:09:32.880 Bloomingdale's Department store for a while was a popular singles 0:09:32.920 --> 0:09:36.280 meeting place. Sire's Roebuck and Holiday Inns are eyeing the 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:40.319 beds and Lake Tahoe's King Castle Hotel has already installed 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:43.800 them in luxury sweets and this is uh. I think 0:09:43.840 --> 0:09:47.959 it continues. Playboy tycoon Hugh Hefner has one king's size, 0:09:48.000 --> 0:09:53.160 of course and covered with Tasmanian bossom. I thought, how 0:09:53.200 --> 0:09:55.360 gross is that? Because what I know is a possum 0:09:55.440 --> 0:09:59.000 is different different. I looked up the TASMANI impossible, super soft, 0:09:59.400 --> 0:10:01.959 I would imagine. And so it's not like American road 0:10:02.040 --> 0:10:06.200 kill on your water bed. Right, It wasn't even made 0:10:06.240 --> 0:10:08.200 from it. It It just had a bunch of live American 0:10:08.240 --> 0:10:11.000 possums on his bed and his water bed you have 0:10:11.400 --> 0:10:15.720 was really weird. But here's the deal. The water bed 0:10:15.880 --> 0:10:18.440 that Charles hall Cree eventually would go on to create, 0:10:18.480 --> 0:10:20.680 and we'll talk about some of his earlier designs aside 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:25.640 from the pleasure bit, he wanted to revolutionize sleeping. Yeah, 0:10:25.679 --> 0:10:29.240 he meant it very seriously. He wanted to have a 0:10:29.240 --> 0:10:34.960 pressure point free mattress that would envelope your body and 0:10:35.000 --> 0:10:37.000 give you the best night sleep of your life. He 0:10:37.040 --> 0:10:40.720 had no intention of it becoming this, which it very 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:45.880 much did. A metaphor for the sexy sixties and seventies, right, 0:10:45.960 --> 0:10:48.640 but it definitely did like you say it was. It's 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:52.400 a really good example of an idea just basically getting 0:10:52.480 --> 0:10:56.560 hijacked big time. And at first he was kind of like, 0:10:56.840 --> 0:10:58.880 I'm just a twenty four year old design suit. Now, 0:10:59.040 --> 0:11:03.080 I don't care. Sure, make your own waterbed knockoff. But 0:11:03.160 --> 0:11:06.840 then over time he definitely came to care and spent 0:11:07.400 --> 0:11:13.240 a couple of decades pursuing um infringement suits here and there, 0:11:13.360 --> 0:11:16.720 patent infringement suits um, which we'll talk about later. But 0:11:16.840 --> 0:11:20.360 at first it was basically like, here's the waterbed world, 0:11:20.400 --> 0:11:23.320 and the world went nuts. Uh. And again, yeah, he 0:11:23.360 --> 0:11:27.079 meant a revolutionized sleep, but the hippies and the people 0:11:27.080 --> 0:11:29.120 who owned head shops, which is where you bought your 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:32.280 water beds early on was at the head shop, said no, 0:11:32.440 --> 0:11:34.800 this is all about sex. And that's how that's how 0:11:34.840 --> 0:11:38.600 it was first sold in the late sixties and early seventies. 0:11:38.840 --> 0:11:42.560 I have never had sexual intercourse on a waterbed, but 0:11:43.160 --> 0:11:45.640 it doesn't it doesn't sound appealing to me, right because 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:48.200 so one of the in this, I think the Washington 0:11:48.240 --> 0:11:51.840 Post article quote a Washington Post article from the seventies 0:11:52.400 --> 0:11:56.079 saying like a waterbed salesman said, it's very like, very 0:11:56.160 --> 0:11:59.280 much like three people are having sex because the bed 0:11:59.360 --> 0:12:03.800 itself is like a third warm body participating in the 0:12:03.840 --> 0:12:06.360 motion or something like in the worst possible way. And 0:12:06.400 --> 0:12:08.760 I looked up Yeah, I was like, it's just weird. 0:12:08.800 --> 0:12:12.280 And I looked up um like sex on a water 0:12:12.360 --> 0:12:18.120 bed on um on a work computer? Right, uh oh yeah, 0:12:18.200 --> 0:12:23.160 the word computer is supertained now um. And the I 0:12:23.480 --> 0:12:26.000 found like this one. I can't remember the website, but 0:12:26.040 --> 0:12:29.520 it's basically like pros and cons. And it sounds like 0:12:29.559 --> 0:12:32.720 it comes down to your preferences, you know, like what 0:12:32.720 --> 0:12:37.960 what like are you into your motions being exaggerated? You know? 0:12:38.200 --> 0:12:41.000 And I guess, yeah, Chuck's laughing because I'm like kind 0:12:41.040 --> 0:12:46.080 of making right, Um, if you're into that, great, if 0:12:46.160 --> 0:12:50.880 you're not, or you're um, apparently it's really like you. 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:54.000 It really is pronounced. It's not something going on in 0:12:54.080 --> 0:12:58.720 the background. It's like, you know and right, So it 0:12:58.800 --> 0:13:01.240 just depends on your prefer says I think. But I 0:13:01.280 --> 0:13:04.880 think a lot of the earliest water beds were we're 0:13:04.960 --> 0:13:07.840 bought by guys who were pretty confident. They could be like, 0:13:07.880 --> 0:13:09.720 I've got a water bed, you want to try it out, 0:13:10.320 --> 0:13:13.400 and that that would happen. It became a punch line, 0:13:13.440 --> 0:13:17.360 like I remember, I feel like every other sitcom or 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:19.600 a movie at some point there was a scene where 0:13:20.160 --> 0:13:22.280 they were like, oh, he's got a water bed, or 0:13:22.280 --> 0:13:24.320 he would just slowly open the door to reveal the 0:13:24.360 --> 0:13:27.040 water bed, and that meant only one thing. It did 0:13:27.200 --> 0:13:31.800 master lover right, So the the and then the waterbed 0:13:31.880 --> 0:13:34.880 invariably like they couldn't make it work because one of 0:13:34.880 --> 0:13:38.200 them would get flopped off or somebody would make it 0:13:38.280 --> 0:13:40.679 spring a leak, and then the leak would just go everywhere. 0:13:41.080 --> 0:13:43.679 Whenever water beds appeared in TV and movies like it 0:13:44.080 --> 0:13:48.559 went badly. All right, let's take a break. I'm all 0:13:48.600 --> 0:13:51.480 hot and bothered. We'll come back and we'll talk about 0:13:51.520 --> 0:14:18.480 some of Charles Hall's early designs right after this. Okay, 0:14:18.520 --> 0:14:21.560 So again, that was like the first reception to water beds. 0:14:21.880 --> 0:14:24.120 Hefner had one, he had to actually had one on 0:14:24.160 --> 0:14:28.520 his jet to um he uh, like one of the 0:14:28.560 --> 0:14:31.680 Smothers brothers bought one. I guess help his sex life out, 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:34.240 guy from Jefferson Airplane. And you bought them at head 0:14:34.280 --> 0:14:38.600 shops and they were sold by waterbed manufacturers again, none 0:14:38.600 --> 0:14:41.200 of whom bothered to get a license from the Charles 0:14:41.240 --> 0:14:43.600 Hall of the inventor and patent holder. But they had 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:48.000 names like wet Dream. Somebody named their company wet Dream 0:14:48.160 --> 0:14:51.360 and that was okay in the seventies. Let me see here, 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:59.000 what else Aquarius, Joyapeutic, aqua beds, Joyapeutic, Um, Aquarius products. 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:02.880 Like you said, water work, what else? That's all I have? 0:15:03.320 --> 0:15:07.760 I think wet Dream. We should have stopped there. Um, 0:15:07.800 --> 0:15:11.000 it's definitely the worst of all of them. So before 0:15:11.080 --> 0:15:13.960 this came about, Charles Hall a couple of his prototype 0:15:13.960 --> 0:15:17.880 early prototypes. Um. One, it sounds sort of like a 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:21.160 bean bag chair almost, but it was a big bag 0:15:21.280 --> 0:15:26.400 chair full of three hundred pounds of liquid corn starch 0:15:27.240 --> 0:15:29.040 that the idea was you would sit in it and 0:15:29.040 --> 0:15:32.440 it would envelop you. It sounds like a nightmare. Yeah, 0:15:32.520 --> 0:15:35.120 Like he didn't mean for it to envelop you. It 0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:37.120 was like he hadn't hit upon the water bed yet. 0:15:37.120 --> 0:15:40.520 He was trying out different substances. But yeah, you just sink. 0:15:40.560 --> 0:15:43.640 Can't gross, all right? So he moved on to jello 0:15:44.520 --> 0:15:47.240 for real, and that didn't work either. That's not a joke, people. 0:15:47.720 --> 0:15:51.440 He put jello in this thing did not have the 0:15:51.520 --> 0:15:56.600 right temperature or consistency. So eventually he would thanks to 0:15:57.200 --> 0:16:01.520 um thanks to vinyl really but coming a very popular thing. 0:16:02.560 --> 0:16:05.960 Uh and and being used for things other than like 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:10.520 car parts and tires and things and oh rings, Vinyl 0:16:10.560 --> 0:16:14.640 became a hot item. So he filled up this vinyl 0:16:14.680 --> 0:16:19.240 bladder with water, had a temperature control device on it. Uh. 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:21.240 And the the idea there was not to have some 0:16:21.280 --> 0:16:23.920 hot bed, but to sink up to your body temperature, right, 0:16:23.960 --> 0:16:26.960 so your muscles would relax. Yeah, he had the purest 0:16:27.000 --> 0:16:30.760 of intentions, I really did, and he he hit upon 0:16:30.800 --> 0:16:36.320 it finally and again in the Masters thesis. Well, was 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:40.000 part of the problem. Summer of love. People are having 0:16:40.080 --> 0:16:43.680 sex all over the place. And uh, there's a story 0:16:43.760 --> 0:16:47.360 named Andrew Kirk who said the basically design and then 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:50.960 late sixties was a free form atmosphere people were really getting. 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:54.760 And if you've ever, like I love design museums, if 0:16:54.760 --> 0:16:56.040 you ever go to some of these, it's kind of 0:16:56.040 --> 0:16:58.880 cool to see what they were doing in the sixties. Um, 0:16:58.920 --> 0:17:01.680 because it was kind of a crazy time for design. Yeah, 0:17:01.760 --> 0:17:04.200 because a lot of people were open to trying new things. 0:17:04.520 --> 0:17:06.760 Up to this point, you had a mattress and you 0:17:06.800 --> 0:17:09.560 were just thankful that I wasn't filled with Hey, you know, 0:17:09.640 --> 0:17:11.680 it had springs and you liked it. That's the way 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:14.720 it was, and you liked it. Um. So the idea 0:17:14.760 --> 0:17:19.960 of this something totally new, like it was two things. One, 0:17:20.280 --> 0:17:23.120 this guy was trying to revolutionized sleep, and it came 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:25.440 at a time when people were willing to like, oh, yeah, 0:17:25.480 --> 0:17:28.240 it's the beds boring, let's try something different. And it 0:17:28.359 --> 0:17:30.840 just kind of came together really well. But again it 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:33.720 got hijacked by people who owned Headshot well, and he 0:17:33.760 --> 0:17:37.200 was in San Francisco. It all kind of converged um 0:17:36.600 --> 0:17:40.679 to work against him, ironically, but he he applied for 0:17:40.680 --> 0:17:42.760 a pet and I think in nineteen sixty eight, but 0:17:42.800 --> 0:17:45.600 it wasn't until nineteen seventy one that it was granted 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:52.200 because prior to his design being UM debuted, like thirty 0:17:52.280 --> 0:17:56.520 or so years prior, Robert Heinlein, the very famous in 0:17:56.560 --> 0:18:01.000 prolific science fiction writer, he had basically described water beds 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.560 so frequently and in such detail that he was considered 0:18:04.600 --> 0:18:09.000 the intellectual property holder of waterbed design. Yeah, the reason 0:18:09.080 --> 0:18:12.439 Heinlin even went to the trouble of he liked to 0:18:12.440 --> 0:18:14.760 describe stuff in his books apparently haven't read any of 0:18:14.800 --> 0:18:17.720 them yet, but very detailed descriptions. Yeah, and one of 0:18:17.720 --> 0:18:20.119 the things that he kept he that always popped up 0:18:20.160 --> 0:18:22.560 was these water beds. And apparently in the thirties he 0:18:22.640 --> 0:18:25.320 spent a lot of time in hospital beds, so he 0:18:25.400 --> 0:18:29.520 was just imagining how they could be improved. And he 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:35.399 described water beds almost exactly like Charles Hall had described them. Yeah, 0:18:35.440 --> 0:18:38.240 he said, UM, A pump to control water level, side 0:18:38.240 --> 0:18:41.840 supports to permit one to float rather than simply lying 0:18:41.840 --> 0:18:45.800 on a not very soft water filled mattress. Thermostatic control 0:18:45.800 --> 0:18:50.399 of temperature, safety interfaces to avoid all possibility of electric shock, 0:18:50.480 --> 0:18:52.680 which was a big sort of urban legend at the time. 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:57.639 You can be electrocuted if you have vigorous sex. Waterproof 0:18:57.640 --> 0:19:03.040 box to make it leakproof um, which was another probably 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:07.120 legitimate um Cohn for a water bed. Sometimes they would 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:10.080 leak back then uh, and then some other things. But 0:19:10.160 --> 0:19:13.440 basically it all came together to form such a robust 0:19:13.720 --> 0:19:15.760 all even though it was in a science fiction novel 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:18.800 that he was he had to like go to court 0:19:19.280 --> 0:19:21.080 and say, I don't know if he was looking for 0:19:21.119 --> 0:19:24.880 money or who. I'm not sure how it came out 0:19:24.920 --> 0:19:27.800 that Highland owned the intellectual property of it. If he 0:19:27.880 --> 0:19:32.000 came out and said that's mine or what. But by 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:35.760 within three years of Chris or Charles Hall coming out 0:19:35.800 --> 0:19:38.560 with this he um, he had the patent for it. 0:19:38.800 --> 0:19:41.720 And even way back in the eighteen hundreds there were 0:19:41.760 --> 0:19:44.560 doctors who created One guy named Dr Neil or No 0:19:44.880 --> 0:19:50.359 or are Not created a hydrostatic bed. He covered a 0:19:50.400 --> 0:19:55.720 warm bath with a rubber cloth and sealed it with varnish. 0:19:55.280 --> 0:20:00.359 And another doctor in Portsmouth, and these were based to 0:20:00.400 --> 0:20:04.520 prevent bed sores, to relieve bed sores, and even highlands 0:20:04.560 --> 0:20:07.000 he said, like you said, he cooked it up because 0:20:07.119 --> 0:20:09.760 he had been in hospitals a lot. Yeah, he's like 0:20:09.840 --> 0:20:12.240 he's getting killed in these hard beds. Yeah. And the 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:17.159 reason you would want some sort of um water filled 0:20:17.160 --> 0:20:20.720 bed for a hospital is because people are laying around 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:23.560 in bed all the time and when you have skin 0:20:23.720 --> 0:20:27.600 covering like a bony layer, you get bed ulcers and 0:20:27.720 --> 0:20:30.520 you don't want those now. So this was to prevent 0:20:30.600 --> 0:20:34.080 bed sores. Um that's why the earliest physicians were coming 0:20:34.200 --> 0:20:38.520 up with them. But so finally by one Charles Hall 0:20:38.560 --> 0:20:42.600 holds the patent and again he was he wanted to 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:47.440 create a serious sleep product and he founded a company 0:20:47.480 --> 0:20:50.840 called Inner space environments, and they were selling like the 0:20:50.880 --> 0:20:54.280 real deal, legit high end water beds. He even named 0:20:54.280 --> 0:20:57.560 it seriously right. He opened like thirty two stores in 0:20:57.600 --> 0:21:01.960 California in the early seventies, and and UM had a 0:21:01.960 --> 0:21:05.080 factory like he was doing it right. His did not leak. 0:21:05.560 --> 0:21:07.560 One of the things that water beds were very much 0:21:07.600 --> 0:21:10.440 known for is that the sheets would pop off. Yeah, 0:21:10.640 --> 0:21:14.240 very well, because sheets fit on his UM. The temperature 0:21:14.280 --> 0:21:17.520 control was great. They were like really high end water 0:21:17.600 --> 0:21:21.480 beds made and designed by the guy who actually designed them. 0:21:21.760 --> 0:21:25.120 The problem is he didn't really pursue any patent stuff, 0:21:25.560 --> 0:21:28.280 and so there were knockoffs out of the gate, and 0:21:28.320 --> 0:21:31.080 it was the knockoffs that leaked. It was the knockoffs 0:21:31.080 --> 0:21:34.399 that had terrible temperature control UM and it was the 0:21:34.440 --> 0:21:37.959 knockoffs that gave water beds a bad name because they 0:21:37.960 --> 0:21:42.600 were fully embracing the sexy advertising. That was part of 0:21:42.600 --> 0:21:48.440 it too, all the knockoffs manufacturers and apparently he pursued 0:21:48.520 --> 0:21:51.479 some of these, but it's he would have spent all 0:21:51.520 --> 0:21:54.760 his time and money pursuing a patent infringement if he 0:21:54.800 --> 0:21:57.600 really tried to go after everyone. And some of these 0:21:57.640 --> 0:21:59.159 didn't make a lot of money, and it was just 0:21:59.200 --> 0:22:02.480 sort of use list to even try, so it wasn't 0:22:02.480 --> 0:22:05.000 worth his time and money. A lot of times he 0:22:05.040 --> 0:22:08.240 said to a lot of people who sold water beds early, 0:22:08.280 --> 0:22:10.800 like early waterbed dealers. Basically they were just trying to 0:22:10.840 --> 0:22:12.920 make some fast money so they could go start a 0:22:13.320 --> 0:22:16.520 pot farm in Oregon. That was like, that's who was 0:22:16.560 --> 0:22:19.600 selling water beds in the early seventies. It also has 0:22:19.640 --> 0:22:22.280 one of the creepiest lines ever in the Atlantic article 0:22:22.320 --> 0:22:25.280 that said something about when Charles Hall initially was selling 0:22:25.280 --> 0:22:27.880 water beds out of the back of his van, right like, man, 0:22:27.960 --> 0:22:30.479 that's the creepiest thing ever. Yeah here, let me let 0:22:30.520 --> 0:22:32.080 me open up my van. You can lay on my 0:22:32.119 --> 0:22:36.720 water bed in the back of my van with with 0:22:36.840 --> 0:22:41.240 the stallion painted on the side. Oh man, speaking of seventies, 0:22:41.280 --> 0:22:43.760 I forgot about the murals on the vands. Remember we 0:22:43.880 --> 0:22:46.919 used to do blog posts and stuff I made like 0:22:47.000 --> 0:22:49.720 a slide show. I remember that vans with art on 0:22:49.760 --> 0:22:52.840 the side, see those every now and then? Gets up. Still, 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:55.280 it's good stuff. You want to take a break before 0:22:55.280 --> 0:23:14.840 we get into the the this straightening of water beds. Yes, sorry, 0:23:25.000 --> 0:23:27.160 I couldn't come up with a better word than straightening. 0:23:27.200 --> 0:23:32.399 I apologize for that. Let me think, I guess legitimizing, 0:23:32.680 --> 0:23:36.480 but I'm thinking like more like a boring, suburbanite zing 0:23:36.800 --> 0:23:39.320 of water beds. Yeah, I mean, here's the thing. We 0:23:39.359 --> 0:23:42.040 say that Hall very much wanted to revolution I sleep 0:23:42.080 --> 0:23:46.240 and he didn't embrace the sexual component of it. But 0:23:46.480 --> 0:23:48.439 he sold a lot of water beds, and he kind 0:23:48.440 --> 0:23:51.600 of knew why a lot of these people were buying him, 0:23:51.640 --> 0:23:54.280 and he wasn't like, I don't think he was so 0:23:54.440 --> 0:23:56.960 pious that he was like, no, I don't want to 0:23:57.000 --> 0:23:59.159 sell them for that reason. I think he eventually was 0:23:59.240 --> 0:24:01.919 kind of like, you know that that's why people bought him, 0:24:01.960 --> 0:24:04.520 and that was okay. But I don't think he just 0:24:04.760 --> 0:24:07.000 I don't think he cheapened his own advertising that way. No, 0:24:07.119 --> 0:24:10.840