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Speaker 1: What a famous kid's TV show host was the guy

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Speaker 1: who invented the first artificial heart, Mark Twain invented brastraps,

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Speaker 1: I'm Patty Steele. Celebrities who are also inventors. Next on

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Speaker 1: the backstory, We're back with the backstory. Why do some

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Speaker 1: people achieve so much? Is it hard work, a curious mind,

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Speaker 1: superior intellect, or is it just playing luck? I mean,

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Speaker 1: there are the folks who become famous in one area

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Speaker 1: but wind up super accomplished in a whole other area too.

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Speaker 1: What's up with that? Back in the nineteen fifties, there

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Speaker 1: was a guy named Paul Winchell who overcame childhood polio

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Speaker 1: abuse at the hands of his mother, a severe stutter,

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Speaker 1: and depression. He wanted to become a doctor, but the

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Speaker 1: family had no money for that, so by the time

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Speaker 1: he was fourteen he was in show business as a ventriloquist,

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Speaker 1: and by twenty six, in the early days of telew

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Speaker 1: he was a major star along with his dummy Jerry Mahoney.

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Speaker 1: At thirty five, still wildly successful, he enrolled in college finally,

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Speaker 1: and eventually he had thirty patents to his name, including

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Speaker 1: a disposable raiser, a blood plasma defroster or whatever that is,

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Speaker 1: a flameless cigarette lighter, and most amazingly, the early version

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Speaker 1: of the very first artificial heart. Oh and by the way,

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Speaker 1: he was also the voice of Tigger on all the

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Speaker 1: early Winnie the pouflicks, and the voice of dozens of

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Speaker 1: characters on Disney films and TV shows. Now. Another superstar

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Speaker 1: with the patent was the gorgeous and brilliant movie actress

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Speaker 1: Hetty Lamar. At the outset of World War II, after

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Speaker 1: a nineteen forty attack by a German U boat killed

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Speaker 1: hundreds of civilians, including dozens of children, Hetty was intrigued

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Speaker 1: with the idea of developing a remote controlled torpedo that

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Speaker 1: could attack a submarine, but she knew they'd also need

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Speaker 1: device that would keep the torpedoes control signal from being jammed.

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Speaker 1: Her patent led to what's now known as spread spectrum technology,

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Speaker 1: and today it's used in wireless technology like Wi Fi,

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Speaker 1: cellular networks, GPS, and Bluetooth. Okay, do you like to

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Speaker 1: nestle into a perfect bucket seat and lean into the speed?

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Speaker 1: You can thank superstar and super macho actor Steve McQueen

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Speaker 1: for that. He was in a lot of movies about racing,

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Speaker 1: and was renowned for his driving stunts in many films,

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Speaker 1: a lot that he performed himself. Now, the thing is,

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Speaker 1: he wanted pure comfort and safety at high speed, so

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Speaker 1: he invented a bucket seat with a wide back and

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Speaker 1: a lot of contouring panels to increase driver safety and comfort.

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Speaker 1: His name is Neil Young, part of Buffalo, Springfield and

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Speaker 1: Crosby Stills, Nash and Young. His music with those bands,

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Speaker 1: as well as from his solo career is iconic. But

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Speaker 1: did you know he is also a fanatic about model trains.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of a beautiful story. Neil is a part

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Speaker 1: owner of model train company Lionel, Plus he has a

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Speaker 1: massive collection of model trains in a three thousand square

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Speaker 1: foot barn, along with seven patents for model train gear.

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Speaker 1: One of the devices he designed was to help his

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Speaker 1: son Ben flip the switches on the trains. Since Ben's

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Speaker 1: cerebral palsy made it tough for him to do so,

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Speaker 1: Neil created the Big Red Button, a remote control device

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Speaker 1: that was much easier for Ben and a lot of

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Speaker 1: other folks to use. Oh and by the way, Neil's

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Speaker 1: investment in the company Lionel as well as his inventions

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Speaker 1: helped Lionel emerge from bankruptcy in two thousand and eight. Finally,

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Speaker 1: tell me this, when I say Mark Twain also known

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Speaker 1: as Samuel Clements, that's his real name. Do you think

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Speaker 1: of Huck Finn or maybe Tom Sawyer. You probably don't

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Speaker 1: think about scrap booking, and you definitely don't think about

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Speaker 1: bra straps. But it turns out that was exactly what

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Speaker 1: he invented. Yeah, he was into invention as well as writing.

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Speaker 1: He made a ton of money off the first self

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Speaker 1: pasting scrap book since he loved to save things in

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Speaker 1: scrap books and wanted to simplify the process. He also

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Speaker 1: loved history and so patented a history trivia game. But

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Speaker 1: most fascinating or amusing was his invention of the bra strap.

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Speaker 1: If you check out the drawings that went with his

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Speaker 1: patent application, you're going to see it looks pretty much

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Speaker 1: identical to today's bra straps and fasteners. Now did he

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Speaker 1: do it in order to make it easier to put

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Speaker 1: on a bra or easier to take off? Now? The

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Speaker 1: only problem with Twain's inventions, and it's true for other

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Speaker 1: inventors as well. He loved taking a shot at developing

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Speaker 1: a million different interesting ideas, but it didn't always work out.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes you take a gamble and sometimes you lose, and

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Speaker 1: that was Twain's achilles heel. He lost a fortune on

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Speaker 1: his inventions, so his writing was really his lasting legacy.

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Speaker 1: But every time a woman slips into or out of

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Speaker 1: a bra she has to give a little salute to

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Speaker 1: Mark Twain. I'm Patty Steele. The Backstory is a production

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Speaker 1: of iHeartMedia and Steel Trap Productions. Our producer is Doug Fraser.

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Speaker 1: Our executive producer is Steve Goldstein of Amplify Media. We're

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Speaker 1: out with new episodes twice a week. Thanks for listening

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Speaker 1: to the Backstory, the pieces of history you didn't know

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Speaker 1: you needed to know.