WEBVTT - Modern Inventions That Are Actually Old 0:00:01.320 --> 0:00:04.240 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:14.080 of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly 0:00:14.200 --> 0:00:19.840 Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. I will talk about 0:00:19.840 --> 0:00:23.280 the genesis of this episode on Friday's episode, because it's 0:00:23.360 --> 0:00:26.360 very silly, but it was born, like so many of 0:00:26.400 --> 0:00:29.320 our topics, out of just seeing something and asking off 0:00:29.320 --> 0:00:33.440 handedly when was that invented? Which I do a lot. 0:00:33.680 --> 0:00:35.639 This led me to look that up and it came 0:00:35.680 --> 0:00:39.080 as a surprise regarding its timing, and I wanted to 0:00:39.080 --> 0:00:41.199 talk about that thing, but I also knew that that 0:00:41.320 --> 0:00:45.000 was not a media enough topic for a whole episode, 0:00:45.240 --> 0:00:47.120 so I decided I would group it with some other 0:00:47.200 --> 0:00:50.400 inventions that were made well before I would have thought, 0:00:50.560 --> 0:00:53.840 probably most people would have thought. There are so many 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:57.280 things in our modern world that people presume our fairly 0:00:57.320 --> 0:01:00.040 recent inventions that aren't. We talk about things like that 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:03.240 all the time, and often that is the result of 0:01:03.280 --> 0:01:05.839 like what I call this sort of present tense hubris, 0:01:05.880 --> 0:01:09.800 where we can't imagine another time or culture needing or 0:01:09.840 --> 0:01:12.360 inventing the things that we use today. But I feel 0:01:12.400 --> 0:01:14.600 like the three things that we're talking about in this 0:01:14.760 --> 0:01:18.399 instance seem, at least to my mind, pretty valid in 0:01:18.680 --> 0:01:22.080 presuming that they are more modern than they are, in 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:27.039 part because they all have close associations with the recent past. 0:01:27.640 --> 0:01:29.760 One of them, the thing that inspired this episode, is 0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:32.880 one of my favorite inventions of all time. So for 0:01:32.959 --> 0:01:35.080 the first thing we're going to talk about, we have 0:01:35.120 --> 0:01:37.080 to go all the way back to the early Common 0:01:37.120 --> 0:01:41.800 era and a scientist known as Heron of Alexandria. Some 0:01:41.959 --> 0:01:46.560 texts give his name as Hero. He's sometimes described as 0:01:46.640 --> 0:01:50.880 being Egyptian because he lived in Alexandria. Other times he's 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:55.040 described as Greek. Some accounts list both. He was likely 0:01:55.080 --> 0:01:58.000 born in Greece. He lived at a time of Greco 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:02.840 Roman dominance throughout the Mediterranean, and Egypt was a Roman province. 0:02:03.440 --> 0:02:06.880 But all of the accounts agree he was very, very smart. 0:02:07.000 --> 0:02:10.880 He was well educated. He understood and wrote about mathematics 0:02:10.880 --> 0:02:15.440 and mechanics from all over the Mediterranean and Mesopotamia. We 0:02:15.520 --> 0:02:18.359 don't have a whole lot of biographical information about him, 0:02:18.480 --> 0:02:21.760 though he's believed to have been born sometime early in 0:02:21.800 --> 0:02:24.960 the first century. We know he was alive in the 0:02:25.040 --> 0:02:28.280 year sixty two because he mentioned an eclipse in his 0:02:28.400 --> 0:02:32.280 writing that's known to have taken place that year. Everything 0:02:32.360 --> 0:02:35.520 else we know about Heron is what he recorded in 0:02:35.560 --> 0:02:38.880 his writings. He wrote a lot about mathematics and mechanics, 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:43.840 but nothing autobiographical. Yeah, if you look up the dates 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:47.160 associated with his life, they are all over the map. 0:02:47.240 --> 0:02:49.640 There are people that will put his date of birth 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:53.639 at around the year zero or one, and other people 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:55.720 that will put his death at around one hundred. And 0:02:55.760 --> 0:02:58.760 I'm like, it's possible, but not super probable at this 0:02:58.840 --> 0:03:01.480 point in time that he could have lived through the 0:03:01.639 --> 0:03:06.320 entire first century. But in any case, his work is 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:09.520 influential in our lives in a number of small ways. 0:03:10.520 --> 0:03:12.919 For example, if you've ever used the idiom that someone 0:03:12.919 --> 0:03:15.519 has made one hundred and eighty degree turn in changing 0:03:15.600 --> 0:03:18.760 their position or their opinion on something, you can thank Heron, 0:03:18.800 --> 0:03:22.360 at least in part. The idea of a circle being 0:03:22.400 --> 0:03:25.359 divided by three hundred and sixty units known as degrees, 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:29.400 actually originated in Babylonia, which used a base sixty system 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:33.520 for mathematics, but Heron is credited with adopting it and 0:03:33.639 --> 0:03:36.640 teaching it widely in the technical school he founded in 0:03:36.680 --> 0:03:40.520 Alexandria and writing about it in his books. But Beyond that, 0:03:40.920 --> 0:03:44.560 his own work predates a lot of similar work, often 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:50.160 by hundreds of years. His math writings include Mechanica, which 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:53.880 included information about the workings of levers and how they 0:03:53.960 --> 0:03:57.400 can be used to bear loads, as well as velocity 0:03:57.600 --> 0:04:01.040 and the use of friction discs to create very ratios. 0:04:01.120 --> 0:04:03.960 These discs or the basics of the kinds of drives 0:04:04.000 --> 0:04:08.200 that would be described as transmissions today. They can transfer 0:04:08.360 --> 0:04:11.800 torque to rotating parts at variable speeds depending on the 0:04:11.880 --> 0:04:16.279 ratio selected in Heron's writings. All of this information was 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:20.279 intended to help architects manage building projects by providing them 0:04:20.320 --> 0:04:25.760 ways to more efficiently transport and lift heavy loads in construction. 0:04:26.839 --> 0:04:31.080 His book Dioptera is essentially a manual for measurement. It 0:04:31.120 --> 0:04:35.760 includes descriptions of various measuring instruments, including a diopter. It 0:04:35.800 --> 0:04:39.039 also included a method to measure distance traveled by a wheel. 0:04:39.680 --> 0:04:42.159 A lot of this book is about how to measure 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:47.200 distance in the interest of land surveying purposes. Heron's three 0:04:47.320 --> 0:04:51.880 volume work Metrica was all about geometry that covered topics 0:04:51.960 --> 0:04:56.000 like the measurement of geometric figures. There are formulas for 0:04:56.160 --> 0:05:00.039 using the lengths of a triangle's sides to calculate its area, 0:05:00.080 --> 0:05:02.240 and a method for finding the square root of a 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:06.520 non square number. Metrica was actually lost for a very 0:05:06.600 --> 0:05:10.600 very long time. This book was mentioned in the writings 0:05:10.680 --> 0:05:13.599 of Utosius of Ascalon, who lived in the late fifth 0:05:13.600 --> 0:05:17.440 and early sixth centuries, but its contents were a mystery. 0:05:18.440 --> 0:05:21.200 Then in the eighteen sixties there was a mention of 0:05:21.240 --> 0:05:25.359 an eleventh century manuscript in a library in Constantinople that 0:05:25.600 --> 0:05:29.159 might contain some of Heron's writings. But this wasn't a 0:05:29.200 --> 0:05:32.280 library just anybody could visit. There were hoops to jump 0:05:32.320 --> 0:05:35.559 through just to get permission to enter. It wasn't until 0:05:35.560 --> 0:05:38.640 eighteen ninety six that German archaeologist and head of the 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:43.159 Royal Museum of Berlin, Richard Shone, was able to identify 0:05:43.200 --> 0:05:47.240 that a copy of Metrica was indeed contained in that manuscript. 0:05:47.920 --> 0:05:51.560 Shona's Sun Hermann published the first critical edition of Metrica 0:05:51.760 --> 0:05:56.080 in nineteen oh three. Haron wrote other books, and even 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:59.120 more have been attributed to him that are almost certainly 0:05:59.160 --> 0:06:02.600 not his work, But the book that's most Germane today 0:06:02.720 --> 0:06:06.560 is Pneumatics. In that work, he describes a variety of 0:06:06.600 --> 0:06:10.000 mechanical devices featuring so many concepts we might think of 0:06:10.040 --> 0:06:15.159 as fairly modern gas power, water power, steam power, atmospheric pressure, 0:06:15.360 --> 0:06:19.080 and pumps, among others. But the section related to today's 0:06:19.080 --> 0:06:23.000 topic is automata. He offers a little bit of multi 0:06:23.279 --> 0:06:25.640 entry for this episode because he invented a lot of 0:06:25.680 --> 0:06:28.640 things that were far far ahead of his time. Yeah, 0:06:28.680 --> 0:06:31.400 he also, just to avoid confusion, did also write another 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:35.400 book called Automata. But the things we're talking about are 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:40.480 in this book pneumatics, and the first one that we're 0:06:40.480 --> 0:06:44.400 going to talk about is the eolapile, which is today 0:06:44.560 --> 0:06:47.960 sometimes also called a hero motor named after him. So 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:50.919 Heron had concluded that air is elastic and that it 0:06:50.960 --> 0:06:54.560 consists of particles that move relative to one another. He 0:06:54.640 --> 0:06:57.960 was essentially onto the idea of airflow and air mechanics, 0:06:58.000 --> 0:07:00.360 although he didn't have it all figured out, and these 0:07:00.360 --> 0:07:03.480 are concepts that Irish chemist robber Boyle was still working 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:06.880 to understand when he created what is often credited as 0:07:06.920 --> 0:07:10.280 the first functioning air pump in the mid sixteen hundreds, 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.120 and Heron's understanding of airflow and how it could be 0:07:14.160 --> 0:07:18.040 impacted by heat led him to develop a rudimentary steam engine, 0:07:18.920 --> 0:07:23.400 the eola pile is something that modern teachers and hobbyists 0:07:23.400 --> 0:07:26.600 recreate all the time, but there's a slight difference in 0:07:26.640 --> 0:07:30.360 the way that these modern versions function compared to the 0:07:30.400 --> 0:07:35.120 one that Heron described in pneumatics. Modern variations often consist 0:07:35.160 --> 0:07:38.680 of a hollow sphere filled with water, which is suspended 0:07:38.720 --> 0:07:42.440 over heat source by two arms. As that water heats up, 0:07:42.520 --> 0:07:46.320 the steam is released through two short armlike valves on 0:07:46.440 --> 0:07:49.160 the sphere's equator, and that causes it to rotate. So 0:07:49.240 --> 0:07:53.120 this is a rudimentary steam turbine that creates a rotary motion. 0:07:53.960 --> 0:07:57.200 But in Heron's original version, that water is actually contained 0:07:57.280 --> 0:07:59.920 in a base vessel. He describes it as a call 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:03.280 caldron with a fitted lid that the ball is suspended over. 0:08:04.120 --> 0:08:07.040 From that cauldron are two tubes. These are the ones 0:08:07.040 --> 0:08:10.160 that the sphere is suspended with, but they're hollow tubes 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:13.440 that carry steam from the cauldron as it's heated and 0:08:13.560 --> 0:08:17.160 into the sphere, which builds up until it releases that 0:08:17.440 --> 0:08:20.760 steam through the equatorial valves, and that's what results in 0:08:20.800 --> 0:08:24.880 the spinning motion. Similar mechanics would not be implemented for 0:08:25.000 --> 0:08:29.520 practical use until the seventeenth century, but Heron's machine had 0:08:29.560 --> 0:08:32.280 no practical use. It was not intended for any type 0:08:32.280 --> 0:08:36.079 of job. It was built as an exploration and examination 0:08:36.200 --> 0:08:39.079 of the effects of heat and air and steam combining, 0:08:39.559 --> 0:08:42.040 and in the first century it was considered nothing more 0:08:42.040 --> 0:08:44.680 than a fancy toy. There just was not a vision 0:08:44.880 --> 0:08:48.199 of how this technology could be used. Yeah, I kind 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:52.200 of think of it as like the mechanical desk toys 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:55.960 that executives might have on their tests, Like this is neat, 0:08:56.120 --> 0:08:59.320 look at spins when I heat it up. But it 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:01.440 could have spletely change the world if they had been 0:09:01.480 --> 0:09:04.480 like I bet we could apply this to a vehicle. 0:09:05.880 --> 0:09:09.720 The other hair and invention, which is similar in concept 0:09:09.720 --> 0:09:13.079 to modern machines and really is the focus of like 0:09:13.160 --> 0:09:16.120 the precursor to a modern machine in terms of the 0:09:16.120 --> 0:09:20.480 context of this episode, is called in his book sacrificial vessel, 0:09:20.559 --> 0:09:24.840 which flows only when money is introduced. This was a 0:09:25.000 --> 0:09:29.240 very rudimentary vending machine, and here is how Heron described it. Quote, 0:09:29.720 --> 0:09:33.240 if into certain sacrificial vessels, a coin of five drachms 0:09:33.320 --> 0:09:37.760 be thrown, water shall flow out and surround them. Let 0:09:37.880 --> 0:09:41.319 the example diagram be a sacrificial vessel or treasure chest 0:09:41.440 --> 0:09:43.920 having an opening in its mouth, and in the chest 0:09:44.480 --> 0:09:47.200 let there be a vessel containing water and a small 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:50.640 box from which a pipe conducts out of the chest. 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:54.079 Near the vessel place a vertical rod about which turns 0:09:54.120 --> 0:09:57.520 a lever widening into the plate parallel to the bottom 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:00.480 of the vessel, while at the extremity is and a 0:10:00.559 --> 0:10:03.319 lid which fits into the box so that no water 0:10:03.440 --> 0:10:07.000 can flow through the tube. This lid, however, must be 0:10:07.080 --> 0:10:10.040 heavier than the plate, but lighter than the plate and 0:10:10.120 --> 0:10:13.680 coin combined. When the coin is thrown through the mouth, 0:10:13.760 --> 0:10:16.880 it will fall upon the plate, and preponderating it will 0:10:16.920 --> 0:10:18.959 turn the beam and raise the lid of the box 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:21.320 so that the water will flow. But if the coin 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:24.080 falls off, the lid will descend and close the box 0:10:24.120 --> 0:10:28.760 so that the discharge ceases. More simply, this setup had 0:10:28.760 --> 0:10:31.679 a plate attached to a lever that would tilt just 0:10:31.880 --> 0:10:34.720 enough to open a valve that allowed water to flow out. 0:10:35.440 --> 0:10:37.960 The coin would slide off the plate as it tilted, 0:10:38.000 --> 0:10:40.200 and once it fell off, the lever would return to 0:10:40.240 --> 0:10:44.880 its original position, closing the valve. This vessel looked sort 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:49.160 of like a semovar. That's a metal urn used to 0:10:49.480 --> 0:10:52.680 make and serve tea, and its intent was to dispense 0:10:52.720 --> 0:10:56.440 holy water at temples. He also created another vessel that 0:10:56.480 --> 0:11:00.000 would dispense wine as water was poured into a separate compartment, 0:11:00.480 --> 0:11:04.160 but as the water dispenser was strictly transactional with money, 0:11:04.360 --> 0:11:07.480 it's more of a true vending machine. The next big 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:14.400 step in vending machines did not happen until London eighteen eighties. Yeah, 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:16.720 coming up, we're going to talk about a very ancient 0:11:16.840 --> 0:11:19.920 invention intended to make the world a more pleasant smelling place. 0:11:20.240 --> 0:11:32.000 But first we will pause for a sponsor break. For 0:11:32.200 --> 0:11:34.680 a lot of people today, it is very normal to 0:11:34.760 --> 0:11:37.640 have a small tin or other container of breath mints 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:42.400 in their bag or pocket. But breath mints are very 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:45.600 far from new. The herbs in the mint family, which 0:11:45.640 --> 0:11:48.840 is lemiakie, are as anyone who's ever grown one, very 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:52.080 hardy perennials. It is in fact harder to control them 0:11:52.200 --> 0:11:55.480 than to get them started outside. They will often appear 0:11:55.480 --> 0:11:58.000 to die back completely in cold temperatures and then pop 0:11:58.120 --> 0:12:01.000 up a new in warm weather, and they bread lake crazy. 0:12:01.760 --> 0:12:04.480 Because of their very assertive nature as a plant that 0:12:04.520 --> 0:12:08.000 spreads easily, and because it grows almost anywhere the origin 0:12:08.120 --> 0:12:11.679 of mint, the plant seems to be completely unclear. If 0:12:11.679 --> 0:12:13.640 you look it up, you will find texts that say 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:17.080 that it originated in any number of areas, including Asia, 0:12:17.440 --> 0:12:21.960 the Mediterranean, Europe, and Africa. Mint has been used in 0:12:22.000 --> 0:12:25.360 a lot of cultures as part of food traditions and 0:12:25.440 --> 0:12:29.400 for its fresh, bright aroma. Blindey the Elder, who lived 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:31.559 in the first century, had a lot to say about 0:12:31.600 --> 0:12:36.120 mint in his writings the Natural History. This isn't precisely 0:12:36.160 --> 0:12:38.680 what we're talking about today in terms of invention, but 0:12:38.800 --> 0:12:41.040 we are going to read a number of quotes from 0:12:41.040 --> 0:12:45.280 that writing to illustrate just how commonly mint was used 0:12:45.800 --> 0:12:49.400 and for a wide range of purposes. Pliny knew how 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:52.400 easy it was to grow mint, noting quote wild mint, 0:12:52.640 --> 0:12:57.200 cat mint, ondieve, and penny royal will grow even without cultivation. 0:12:58.600 --> 0:13:01.520 That isn't the only mint of its heartiness in the 0:13:01.600 --> 0:13:05.000 Natural History. Pliny also writes quote, the mint that is 0:13:05.120 --> 0:13:08.720 used in the dishes at rustic entertainments pervades the tables 0:13:08.760 --> 0:13:12.800 far and wide with its agreeable odor. When once planted, 0:13:12.920 --> 0:13:16.440 it lasts a considerable length of time. It bears too, 0:13:16.520 --> 0:13:19.960 a strong resemblance to pennyroyal, a property of which is, 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:22.640 as mentioned by us, more than once to flour when 0:13:22.760 --> 0:13:26.360 kept in our larders. So this also suggests that even 0:13:26.400 --> 0:13:29.040 when you're not taking care of mint is a cultivated plant, 0:13:30.120 --> 0:13:35.280 it can and will still grow on its o Pliny 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:38.760 writes of mint being used as an antidote for poison. Quote, 0:13:38.840 --> 0:13:41.760 leaves of wild mint are kept dried and reduced to 0:13:41.800 --> 0:13:45.040 a fine powder as a remedy for poisons of every description. 0:13:45.800 --> 0:13:48.520 Spread on the ground or burnt, this plant has the 0:13:48.559 --> 0:13:53.000 effect of driving away scorpions. He also comments on its 0:13:53.040 --> 0:13:57.120 flavorful nature and claims that it has a benefit to milk, 0:13:57.320 --> 0:14:00.440 writing quote, the very smell of mint ree that meets 0:14:00.440 --> 0:14:03.760 the spirits and its flavor gives a remarkable zest to food. 0:14:04.440 --> 0:14:07.120 Hence it is that it is so generally an ingredient 0:14:07.160 --> 0:14:10.760 in our sauces. It has the effect of preventing milk 0:14:10.800 --> 0:14:14.439 from turning sour or curdling and thickening. Hence it is 0:14:14.640 --> 0:14:17.559 that it is so generally put into milk use for drinking, 0:14:17.640 --> 0:14:21.040 to prevent any danger of persons being choked by it 0:14:21.120 --> 0:14:25.160 in a curdled state. So much yuck about this, heads up, 0:14:25.200 --> 0:14:28.280 You cannot keep milk from going bad by adding mint 0:14:28.320 --> 0:14:31.520 to it. At best, it might for a little while 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:35.080 mask the sourness of milk that is in his very 0:14:35.120 --> 0:14:38.680 early as stages of going bad. But also choking on 0:14:38.760 --> 0:14:42.400 milk that's super curdled just seems like you weren't paying attention. 0:14:43.120 --> 0:14:49.080 Yuck across the board. If you are about to give 0:14:49.120 --> 0:14:53.040 a big speech, Pliny suggest drinking mint tea quote the 0:14:53.120 --> 0:14:55.120 juice of mint is good for the voice when a 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:58.760 person is about to engage in a contest of eloquence, 0:14:59.240 --> 0:15:02.920 but only when taken just before. Pliny included a lot 0:15:02.920 --> 0:15:05.480 of treatments that could be made with mint in his writing. 0:15:05.520 --> 0:15:08.520 There are twenty remedies that can be made with wild mint, 0:15:08.600 --> 0:15:11.680 and forty one from cultivated mint. And then outside of those, 0:15:12.240 --> 0:15:15.760 he noted how pleasant it could be simply to eat it. Quote. 0:15:15.840 --> 0:15:18.960 If the air is inhaled by a person when eating peppermint, 0:15:19.160 --> 0:15:22.040 he will be sensible of a cold feeling in the mouth. 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:25.400 It's the York peppermint patty spiel, just with the mint 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:29.320 at its base. But Pliny's writing about mint was drawing 0:15:29.320 --> 0:15:31.760 on cultural knowledge of it that had been circulating for 0:15:31.880 --> 0:15:35.280 hundreds of years already, and the use that we're focusing 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:37.920 on is as a cure for bad breath, although I 0:15:37.960 --> 0:15:41.400 will say mint is not called out specifically in what 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:44.800 we're about to talk about, but there is this term 0:15:44.880 --> 0:15:49.640 that's like general herbs available, and we know at the 0:15:49.680 --> 0:15:52.960 time that mint was growing very readily in this area, 0:15:53.080 --> 0:15:57.200 so presumably it was one of the herbs included. Even today, 0:15:58.440 --> 0:16:03.200 there are so many causes for breath odor that it 0:16:03.240 --> 0:16:06.080 can actually be hard to identify what the cause is 0:16:06.120 --> 0:16:09.480 in a given person. Obviously, good oral hygiene can help 0:16:09.520 --> 0:16:13.400 prevent the growth of bacteria that's often associated with foul breath, 0:16:13.600 --> 0:16:15.880 but there are a lot of other causes of bad breath. 0:16:15.960 --> 0:16:18.040 If you have dry mouth, you're more prone to it, 0:16:18.400 --> 0:16:21.120 or if your diet includes certain foods, you might have 0:16:21.200 --> 0:16:23.320 bad breath, even if you're great at brushing and flossing. 0:16:24.040 --> 0:16:26.960 Various health conditions can also lead to breath that smells 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:29.640 less than fresh, and this has been a problem since 0:16:29.720 --> 0:16:32.280 humans existed. But we are jumping all the way back 0:16:32.320 --> 0:16:36.480 to ancient Egypt and one of their solutions for yuckie breath. 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:39.920 We talked a bit about dentistry and ancient Egypt, and 0:16:40.000 --> 0:16:42.720 our two part episode on the history of dentistry. In 0:16:42.720 --> 0:16:45.760 May of twenty twenty two, in part one of the episode, 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:49.800 we discussed how the Ebers Papyrus included information on packing teeth, 0:16:49.920 --> 0:16:55.080 basically doing fillings, regrowing gum tissue, and even putting rudimentary 0:16:55.120 --> 0:16:58.600 bridgework into the mouths of patience. It wasn't a time 0:16:58.760 --> 0:17:01.280 where there was no denise care, but that care was 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:03.560 not as advanced as the care you would get today. 0:17:04.280 --> 0:17:06.480 That means that even people who had the means to 0:17:06.600 --> 0:17:09.840 access dental care were almost certainly going to develop some 0:17:10.040 --> 0:17:13.320 kind of problem which could result in bad breath. And 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:16.080 as we mentioned just a moment ago, there are plenty 0:17:16.119 --> 0:17:19.679 of other things that can cause breath issues, and the 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:23.040 Ebers Papyrus there was a treatment for that, and that 0:17:23.200 --> 0:17:29.119 is breath mins, invented by the ancient Egyptians. The actual entry, 0:17:29.200 --> 0:17:32.359 which to be clear we obviously only have from a translation, 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:36.239 initially begins as an air freshener for the home, and 0:17:36.280 --> 0:17:40.280 that reads as follows quote substances to use in order 0:17:40.359 --> 0:17:42.719 to make pleasant the smell of the house or of 0:17:42.760 --> 0:17:47.440 the clothes dried mirr elderberries, incense, cyprus resin of aloes, 0:17:47.920 --> 0:17:52.080 sebit resin kalmus from the land tah in Asia in 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:56.000 a coon grain mastics directs, crush a grind, make into 0:17:56.040 --> 0:17:59.720 one and put on the fire another for the woman 0:17:59.720 --> 0:18:04.000 to make they're out these ingredients. According to the other instructions, 0:18:04.520 --> 0:18:08.560 put in honey, cook, mix, form into little balls. They 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:11.960 shall fumigate with them. It is also worthwhile to make 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:14.280 mouthpills out of them to make the smell of the 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:20.399 mouth agreeable. So basically, combine various good smelling things that 0:18:20.480 --> 0:18:23.280 you might have on hand, cook them in honey, and 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:27.760 form that into tablets. These probably we're not super tasty, 0:18:29.160 --> 0:18:31.640 and also they don't really contain any mint, at least 0:18:31.680 --> 0:18:35.440 according to this list. But the mention of calamus is interesting. 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:38.760 It is referring to calamus, which comes up in other 0:18:38.800 --> 0:18:43.000 papyri from ancient Egypt. Commonly it's known as sweet flag. 0:18:43.080 --> 0:18:48.840 It is toxic and has psychoactive chemical components, So maybe 0:18:48.840 --> 0:18:54.679 it just made people think their breath smell better. Definitely 0:18:54.960 --> 0:18:58.200 a far cry from the many minty options for breath 0:18:58.200 --> 0:19:01.600 that there are today. So by the time that that 0:19:01.720 --> 0:19:04.720 Pliny was writing several hundred years later, they had figured 0:19:04.720 --> 0:19:06.800 out the mint could be involved in this whole thing. 0:19:06.960 --> 0:19:10.640 To keep your breath delightful. The next invention we're going 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:13.840 to talk about involves various sparkly things, and we're going 0:19:13.920 --> 0:19:15.600 to get to that right after we hear from the 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:28.520 sponsors that keep the show going. On September twenty fourth, 0:19:28.560 --> 0:19:31.240 eighteen eighty one, in Hamilton, Ohio, which is part of 0:19:31.320 --> 0:19:35.520 the Cincinnati metro area, Bernard H. Weiste and Anna M. 0:19:35.560 --> 0:19:38.760 Gold Camp Weiste had a son named Louis Bernard WEISTI, 0:19:38.800 --> 0:19:42.360 who would grow up to patent one of my favorite things. 0:19:43.000 --> 0:19:45.840 There is not a whole lot of information about mister Weiste, 0:19:45.960 --> 0:19:48.480 but he did at some point mary a woman named 0:19:48.520 --> 0:19:52.720 Florence Bliss Stemball and start a family. Lewis and Florence 0:19:52.760 --> 0:19:56.400 had two daughters, Helen born in nineteen thirteen and Bonnie, 0:19:56.440 --> 0:20:00.720 born in nineteen seventeen. But even when we was still 0:20:00.720 --> 0:20:03.520 a kid, there was a mention of a mirror ball 0:20:03.720 --> 0:20:06.960 in a trade paper put out by a Charleston, Massachusetts 0:20:07.119 --> 0:20:10.160 Electricians union in eighteen ninety seven. So that's right, we're 0:20:10.160 --> 0:20:13.000 going to talk about what would later become known as 0:20:13.080 --> 0:20:17.560 the disco ball. Holly and I each kind of went 0:20:17.600 --> 0:20:24.000 on a little expedition trying to find this periodical. Both 0:20:24.160 --> 0:20:27.760 mental Floss and Vice say that this periodical carried the 0:20:27.800 --> 0:20:31.080 write up about the union's annual party where this mirrored 0:20:31.160 --> 0:20:36.520 ball apparently scattered sparkling light all around the room. We 0:20:36.760 --> 0:20:42.200 did find a union paper that wrote up this event, 0:20:42.440 --> 0:20:45.760 but had no mention of a mirror ball in it, 0:20:46.240 --> 0:20:50.119 so it's possible there was just a different version that 0:20:50.280 --> 0:20:56.000 came directly from the union rather than like Union country 0:20:56.040 --> 0:20:59.360 wide paper, which is the one that we had found, Right, 0:20:59.400 --> 0:21:01.159 we were looking at the bigger one that may have 0:21:01.160 --> 0:21:08.520 aggregated other articles and may have edited right. In addition 0:21:08.680 --> 0:21:12.199 to this lack of mention of the mirror ball and 0:21:12.280 --> 0:21:14.800 the one version of this Holly and I found, there 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:18.280 are no photos of whatever this looked like. It is 0:21:18.359 --> 0:21:21.800 often noted as the first time that a mirrored ball 0:21:22.040 --> 0:21:26.359 was mentioned in the historical record. If it did look 0:21:26.960 --> 0:21:31.520 something like today's disco ball. There's no attribution regarding who 0:21:31.560 --> 0:21:37.160 came up with this decoration, which was at the Christmas party. Yeah, 0:21:37.240 --> 0:21:42.760 we also don't know how the one that we know 0:21:43.000 --> 0:21:47.199 got invented came to be. We have no information about 0:21:47.240 --> 0:21:51.879 the inspiration behind it. Where we Stee's brain went. You 0:21:51.880 --> 0:21:53.359 know what I'd like to do is glue a lot 0:21:53.440 --> 0:21:55.960 of mirrors on something and throw light on it. But 0:21:56.040 --> 0:22:02.040 if we jump forward in Lewis Wees's life, there is 0:22:02.160 --> 0:22:06.639 plenty of newspaper coverage about his patented invention, which he 0:22:06.760 --> 0:22:10.679 called the myriad reflector. He filed a patent for the device, 0:22:10.840 --> 0:22:14.439 his Myriad Reflector, on February twelfth, nineteen sixteen, and he 0:22:14.520 --> 0:22:17.880 was granted that patent almost a year later, on February 0:22:17.920 --> 0:22:22.840 sixth of nineteen seventeen. The technical portion of this patent 0:22:23.000 --> 0:22:25.639 at the end of the copy is straightforward, as it 0:22:25.640 --> 0:22:28.919 would need to be. It's described as quote one, a 0:22:29.000 --> 0:22:33.640 myriad reflector comprising mirrors mounted to form a polyhedron, bounded 0:22:33.680 --> 0:22:37.679 by a convex system of plane faces, in combination with 0:22:37.840 --> 0:22:40.760 means for suspending the device so that it may be 0:22:40.880 --> 0:22:46.360 swung and rotated simultaneously to produce myriad reflections when light 0:22:46.480 --> 0:22:51.760 rays from an extraneous source are thrown thereon. He also 0:22:51.840 --> 0:22:54.680 described it a second time in an almost identical way, 0:22:55.280 --> 0:22:58.800 but specifying that the mirrors could be separated slightly by 0:22:58.840 --> 0:23:02.080 a non reflective sir. This was a reference to the 0:23:02.160 --> 0:23:06.280 patent being about the mirrors not necessarily on a spherical shape, 0:23:06.560 --> 0:23:10.600 but on any shape quote to suit the particular requirements, 0:23:11.119 --> 0:23:14.119 which is a pretty astute way of cutting off copycats 0:23:14.160 --> 0:23:17.600 for making and these sort of hanging mirrored reflectors in 0:23:17.640 --> 0:23:20.680 shapes that were not spheares trying to patent those two. 0:23:21.400 --> 0:23:24.439 But while that wording is legally smart, there is some 0:23:24.560 --> 0:23:28.199 rather more florid language in the general description that I 0:23:28.320 --> 0:23:32.280 found rather charming. We see wrote quote the object of 0:23:32.280 --> 0:23:36.199 my invention is to produce a myriad reflector comprising a 0:23:36.240 --> 0:23:40.000 plurality of reflecting surfaces, the same to be arranged in 0:23:40.080 --> 0:23:43.720 such a manner that the several reflections shall be projected 0:23:43.760 --> 0:23:47.199 at varying angles, the device itself being arranged so that 0:23:47.240 --> 0:23:50.040 it may be rotated or otherwise moved, so that the 0:23:50.080 --> 0:23:54.800 reflections may produce a scintillating and spectacular effect. It is 0:23:54.920 --> 0:23:58.560 scintillating and spectacular. Oh, he knew the key to my heart. 0:23:58.720 --> 0:24:02.439 I'm a magpie of my soul. The exact timing is 0:24:02.480 --> 0:24:05.479 not clear, but around the time Westy got his patent, 0:24:05.680 --> 0:24:09.439 or shortly thereafter, Westy's friend Benny Friedman, who owned a 0:24:09.520 --> 0:24:13.600 tailor's shop, asked Lewis, who went by lou if he 0:24:13.680 --> 0:24:15.720 wanted to use some space in the shop to set 0:24:15.760 --> 0:24:18.680 up his own venture, and he did. He founded the 0:24:18.840 --> 0:24:22.480 LB West Decorating Company out of that space, and soon 0:24:22.560 --> 0:24:25.399 he was getting large contracts to set up parties and 0:24:25.520 --> 0:24:30.399 municipal celebrations, and of course to sell his Myriad reflector 0:24:30.560 --> 0:24:34.240 for those events. And to be really clear, the Myriad 0:24:34.240 --> 0:24:38.800 reflector was a big deal. It was touted constantly in 0:24:38.880 --> 0:24:43.520 newspapers by ballrooms and entertainment venues that had acquired one 0:24:43.720 --> 0:24:47.520 as a draw. Reading through newspapers, it seems as though 0:24:47.520 --> 0:24:49.679