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Speaker 1: Welcome to steph you missed in history class from how

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Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

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Speaker 1: I'm Holly Frying and I'm Tracy to Wilson. So, Tracy,

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Speaker 1: you saw The Graduate. I'm sure you probably remember the

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Speaker 1: scene that lots of people remember because it's kind of

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Speaker 1: a famous one liner where a family friend give gives

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Speaker 1: Dustin Hoffman's character Ben, who is the person who has

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Speaker 1: just graduated, a one word piece of career advice, and

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Speaker 1: that word, of course plastics. Plastics. And I love that movie.

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Speaker 1: And The Graduate came out in n seven, so you

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Speaker 1: might think based on that that plastics were invented just

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Speaker 1: a little while before then, if it was considered the

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Speaker 1: next big industry, But in fact, class plastic came into

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Speaker 1: being decades earlier. And as I sometimes do when they

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Speaker 1: are these uh kind of mystery items of public opinion,

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Speaker 1: I will ask friends and family about when they think

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Speaker 1: something happened, just to get a rough gauge as I

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Speaker 1: go into things. And I got answers from it. Wasn't

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Speaker 1: that a World War two thing? To um? Wasn't that

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Speaker 1: like thirties or post depression? But they weren't there all

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Speaker 1: a little later in the game. It was actually way

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Speaker 1: before that. And that's what we're going to talk about

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Speaker 1: today is plastics. Kind of the man who's come to

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Speaker 1: been come to be known as the father of plastics.

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Speaker 1: Less than a week before President Abraham Lincoln would deliver

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Speaker 1: the Gettysburg Address, Leo Henrick Bakelod was born in a Gainst, Belgium.

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Speaker 1: That was on November fourteenth, eighteen sixty three. His parents

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Speaker 1: weren't wealthy. His father, Charles, repaired shoes and his mother, Rosalie,

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Speaker 1: was a domestic servant. And Leo was really smart and

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Speaker 1: curious from a very very young age, but his thirst

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Speaker 1: for knowledge was almost kind of shut down by his father.

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Speaker 1: He wanted him to take a practical route in life,

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Speaker 1: and he wanted to he wanted his son to apprentice

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Speaker 1: as a tradesman when he entered his teen years, but

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Speaker 1: mother intervened and she advocated that her son should attend

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Speaker 1: high school. During his high school years, Leo would attend

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Speaker 1: regular school during the day and then classes against municipal

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Speaker 1: technical school at night. His technical school classes included economics, mathematics, physics,

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Speaker 1: and chemistry. Yeah, so he was like basically doubling down

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Speaker 1: on his education. He was taking a lot of advanced

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Speaker 1: extra courses just because he was, as we said, very curious.

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Speaker 1: And he began attending the university again at the age

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Speaker 1: of seventeen, which was younger than the average age under

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Speaker 1: a city scholarship, and just two years later he had

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Speaker 1: received his Bachelor of Science. So he continued sort of

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Speaker 1: this accelerated learning, and he continued his studies after his

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Speaker 1: bachelor his bachelor's degree, and in eighteen eighty four he

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Speaker 1: graduated with a Doctorate of Science maxima cum laudie at

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Speaker 1: the age of just twenty one. When he was in school,

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Speaker 1: Leo fell in love with the daughter of his professor

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Speaker 1: and mentor theatre sports. Leo married Selene Sworts on August

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Speaker 1: eighty nine and the marriage was very happy one. For

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Speaker 1: their honeymoon, the two of them went to the United

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Speaker 1: States on a travel scholarship that that Leo had been awarded,

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Speaker 1: and they really enjoyed their time in the States and

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Speaker 1: they decided to set down permanent roots. They eventually settled

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Speaker 1: in in New York and Leo took a job as

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Speaker 1: a chemist with photo equipment manufacturer E. An A. T.

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Speaker 1: Anthony and Company. The couple had three children, George Nina

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Speaker 1: and Jenny. Jenny was born in eighteen nineties, so that

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Speaker 1: was very early in their marriage, but she died of

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Speaker 1: influenza when she was only five. Yeah, Georgia Nina went

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Speaker 1: on to adult lives. However. In eighteen ninety three, Bigerland

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Speaker 1: left his job at the Photo Equipment UH Company and

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Speaker 1: he founded the Nepra Chemical Company. As part of his

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Speaker 1: new chemical venture, he worked on advancing the way photographs

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Speaker 1: were developed. For a long time, indirect sunlight was part

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Speaker 1: of the process, but that was really limiting, and that

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Speaker 1: meant that an overcast day could just shut down the

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Speaker 1: process completely. So this new process that he developed used

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Speaker 1: artificial light from gas lamps, and this was a pretty

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Speaker 1: huge step forward. It was also a pretty huge success

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Speaker 1: for Nepra, and the Velox paper that he invented and

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Speaker 1: that was used in this method spiked in sales, although

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Speaker 1: it was not instantaneous. It took some time to catch on.

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Speaker 1: He once said of his Velox paper and this new

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Speaker 1: developing technique quote, I had been too optimistic and believing

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Speaker 1: that the photographers were ready to abandon the old slow

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Speaker 1: process of making photographic prints. I had to find out

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Speaker 1: then how difficult it is to teach anything new to

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Speaker 1: people once they get used to older methods. So yeah,

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Speaker 1: he didn't have immediate catch on that. He went on

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Speaker 1: to talk about how really it was sort of the

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Speaker 1: amateur photographers and the new photographers that were willing to

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Speaker 1: try it, and they sort of got the ground swell

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Speaker 1: of support around this Velox paper, and eventually interest in

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Speaker 1: the paper grew and by it really had the attention

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Speaker 1: of the Eastman Kodak Company. Is actually an interesting story here,

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Speaker 1: but we have to preface it with a caveat. This

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Speaker 1: was relayed by his longtime driver, Dick Richter, and it

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Speaker 1: was a number of years after the incident reportedly happened. Uh. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: So in ninety seven Richter, who had been the chauffeur

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Speaker 1: for the Bakelands for quite some time, relayed this story

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Speaker 1: of how the inventor UH and the Eastman Kodak Company

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Speaker 1: came to their eventual agreement. Uh. The Velox paper that

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Speaker 1: was developed at Nebra Chemical was really putting a dent

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Speaker 1: in Kodak sales. So the larger company made an offer

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Speaker 1: to buy the patent, and initially Leo Bakland refused, so

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Speaker 1: Kodak came back with a much bigger offer, which was

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Speaker 1: a million dollars. Bakland supposedly gave Kodak the information to

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Speaker 1: produce the paper, which Codac did, but the development process

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Speaker 1: did not work. Uh So, we've mentioned on previous episodes

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Speaker 1: when we talked about inventors that patents often have a

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Speaker 1: step or a component admitted so that the original inventor

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Speaker 1: can retain trade secrets and prevent anyone from using the

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Speaker 1: patent without paying royalties. And it appears, at least again

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Speaker 1: according to this story told by their their longtime driver,

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Speaker 1: that Bakerland did precisely that with his Velox paper. When

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Speaker 1: the paper didn't work in the Eastman Kodak labs, they

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Speaker 1: went back to Bakerland, who allegedly told him that they

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Speaker 1: paid for the patent and not the knowledge that was

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Speaker 1: in his head. After he got an additional payment of

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Speaker 1: a hundred thousand additional dollars, he explained to them that

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Speaker 1: a chemical solution was needed to activate to activate the

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Speaker 1: process and then later removed. So whether or not this

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Speaker 1: chauffeur's version of the immense is accurate does make a

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Speaker 1: good story, but we do know that Bakerland sold his

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Speaker 1: Velox paper rights to Eastman Kodak for one million dollars,

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Speaker 1: which is a huge sum of money when you consider

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Speaker 1: this is the beginning of the twentieth century. UH, and

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Speaker 1: so flush with money from that deal, he and his

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Speaker 1: bride moved to a much larger home in the area

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Speaker 1: of Yonkers, New York known as Harmony Park. And their

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Speaker 1: new estate was called snug Rock and it included a

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Speaker 1: three story house, a separate cottage, a garage, and a stable.

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Speaker 1: And the stable was like a one and a half

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Speaker 1: stories and they eventually converted it into a lab so

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Speaker 1: that Dr Baitland could just do his work right there

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Speaker 1: at home. And before we get to what he does

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Speaker 1: with his free time that he has, now that he

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Speaker 1: is a man of means and leisure, do you want

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Speaker 1: again that is squares based dot com slash history. So

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Speaker 1: UH Leo Bakeland is in his new lab. He's really

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Speaker 1: still quite young. He's only thirty five at this point

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Speaker 1: when he's made this huge deal with Eastman kodak UH

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Speaker 1: and he's able to do whatever he pleases, which is

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Speaker 1: kind of a dream for most of us. UH and

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Speaker 1: his experiments started focusing on combinations of phenol and for

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Speaker 1: melde him and this was a popular combination for scientists

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Speaker 1: to be working with at the time because of the

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Speaker 1: resins it created. UH. There were various different scientists and

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Speaker 1: inventors working with it, and Bakerland was really frank about

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Speaker 1: his interest in this area. He was in it because

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Speaker 1: he thought it was really lucrative. So many experiments by

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Speaker 1: other chemists had tried unsuccessfully to create an alternative to celluloid,

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Speaker 1: which had been invented four decades prior by brothers John

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Speaker 1: Wesley Hyatt and Isaiah Hyatt. They had come up with

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Speaker 1: their plastic for a contest to create a substitute for

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Speaker 1: ivory in billiard balls, which they won. Yeah, at that point,

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Speaker 1: due to some over hunting, ivory was getting harder and

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Speaker 1: harder to come by. Uh, So billiard companies wanted to

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Speaker 1: figure out a new way to manufacture their the balls

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Speaker 1: used in billiards, and so that they sponsored this contest.

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Speaker 1: I think the prize was like ten thousand dollars. And

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Speaker 1: so Bakeland saw colleagues and uh, you know, other chemists

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Speaker 1: and inventors just constantly meeting with frustration over their attempts

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Speaker 1: to create something that would compete with celluloid or be

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Speaker 1: better than it. So he was like, I'm not going

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Speaker 1: to get in that game. I'm gonna focus on shellac instead.

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Speaker 1: And natural shellak, which had to be harvested from a

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Speaker 1: residin that was made by Beatles, was almost always in

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Speaker 1: short supply compared to demand. At this time. It was

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Speaker 1: popular for use in electrical cable installation, and as modern

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Speaker 1: electrical needs were growing very quickly and called for more

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Speaker 1: and more shellac. There was no way for the gathering

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Speaker 1: of natural sources to keep up with that, so Bakeland thought,

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Speaker 1: synthetic She'll black is the way to go. This is

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Speaker 1: going to be a huge success. Working with his assistant

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Speaker 1: Nathaniel Thurlow, he developed a shellak, but it didn't turn

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Speaker 1: out to be the gangbuster hit that they hoped for,

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Speaker 1: so then they shifted to the idea of creating a

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Speaker 1: synthetic resin that could be infused into wood and give

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Speaker 1: it greater strength. And Bakerland noticed during these experiments with

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Speaker 1: phenol and for melde hyde that again still using those

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Speaker 1: because they were the popular resin combo, that there was

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Speaker 1: an interesting effect. So he was treating wood again, trying

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Speaker 1: to infuse it with some sort of reson and make

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Speaker 1: it harder, but it wasn't making the wood any harder. However,

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Speaker 1: the wood was then oozing out a residue that was

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Speaker 1: very hard. His notebook entry for his final experiment on

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Speaker 1: June seven reads asbestos plus a in sealed tube. I

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Speaker 1: found two broken, perhaps in irregular expansion, but the reaction

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Speaker 1: seems to have been satisfactory because the resulting stick was

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Speaker 1: very high hard and below where there was some unmixed

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Speaker 1: liquid A, there was an end question mark of solidified matter,

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Speaker 1: yellowish and hard and entirely similar to the product obtained

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Speaker 1: by simply heating a alone and skilled tube. This looks promising,

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Speaker 1: and it will be worthwhile to determine in how far

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Speaker 1: this mass, which I will call D, is able to

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Speaker 1: make molded materials, either alone or in conjunctions with other

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Speaker 1: solid materials as for instance, asbestos, cassine, zinc, oxid starch,

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Speaker 1: different in organic powders, and lamp black, and thus make

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Speaker 1: a substitute for celluloid and for hard rubber. Heah, And

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Speaker 1: just for clarity, And this is the way I laid

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Speaker 1: out the outline. That's not his final experiment ever, Just

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Speaker 1: on that day of June eighteenth that he rates this

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Speaker 1: out and his entry for the following day follows up

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Speaker 1: on this work. He really feels like he's kind of

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Speaker 1: onto something. Uh. And the compound that he had been

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Speaker 1: calling substance D, which he was able to reproduce, he

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Speaker 1: then started referring to in his notes as it's spelled

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Speaker 1: back A lite B A K A l I T

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Speaker 1: e uh. And while that first mentioned that the name

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Speaker 1: is spelled with two a's. It shifted to bake light

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Speaker 1: in subsequent notes, so be A K E L I

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Speaker 1: T E. And at this point he had created the

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Speaker 1: first holy synthetic plastic. So a quick note on synthetic plastic.

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Speaker 1: The Hyatt brothers had created celluloid by modifying natural materials,

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Speaker 1: so cellulous nitrate and camper. But Baelan wasn't using natural

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Speaker 1: materials in his resent experiments, so that's not this is different. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's why. Uh, it's referred to as a synthetic plastic.

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Speaker 1: And according to a pamphlet that was written about the

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Speaker 1: apparatus that was used in bake light production, and we're

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Speaker 1: going to talk about that apparatus in just a moment.

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Speaker 1: This was also the first instance of an entirely man

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Speaker 1: made material. And I don't know why, but reading that

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Speaker 1: while I was putting together notes on this just kind

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Speaker 1: of blew my mind that the first man made material

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Speaker 1: was in the early nineteen hundreds. His first patent application

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Speaker 1: related to bake a light was in nineteen o six,

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Speaker 1: although it wasn't until nineteen o nine that the invention

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Speaker 1: was announced. He was a smart man and he wanted

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Speaker 1: to protect his work throughout his development. He actually had

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Speaker 1: hundreds of patents that were related to the invention of

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Speaker 1: bake a light alone. Uh. And it's actually not surprising

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Speaker 1: that he was so careful with his patent filings, since

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Speaker 1: his patent Velox is really what set him up in

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Speaker 1: life and and made him a success. In a speech

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Speaker 1: that he gave to the American Chemical Society on February

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Speaker 1: eight of nineteen o nine, he officially launched bake light

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Speaker 1: into this public sphere using a steam pressure unit called

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Speaker 1: the bake Aalizer, which I just love that name. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He started this semi commercial enterprise right there in his

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Speaker 1: own lab, producing bake light for customers, most of whom

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Speaker 1: were using it for electrical insulators. A Bacalizer which is

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Speaker 1: in the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, although not

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Speaker 1: at the moment on display. It's about six ft or

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Speaker 1: two meters tall and roughly a yard in diameter. It

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Speaker 1: looks like a giant fat capsule on legs with a

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Speaker 1: round base, and according to the museum site, it's still

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Speaker 1: in usable condition. Yeah. It sort of looks like a

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Speaker 1: wonderful steampunk fans dream because it's got lots of cool

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Speaker 1: valves coming off of it and uh, you know, a

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Speaker 1: big cool valve handle. It's really quite lovely. Uh. Bakeland's

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Speaker 1: orders quickly grew to the point that he could not

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Speaker 1: keep working just from his lab and his you know,

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Speaker 1: one little bacalizer, and so in en the General bake

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Speaker 1: Light Corporation was founded. It eventually changed its name to

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Speaker 1: the bake Lake Company, and over the years it expanded

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Speaker 1: until it occupied a one d and twenty acre plants.

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Speaker 1: So the demands for these plastics was huge. Initially, bake

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Speaker 1: light was used in automotive and electrical applications because it

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Speaker 1: was melt resistant and wouldn't conduct electricity. It was just

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Speaker 1: really perfect for those uses. But soon it's used broadened

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Speaker 1: into a wide range of items, including pens, jewelry, handles

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Speaker 1: for catching, catching utensils, and the like. Genuine bake light

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Speaker 1: jewelry is now really a collector's item. Yeah. If you

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Speaker 1: do a quick search online, you'll find various sites that

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Speaker 1: are like, Okay, how do identify whether your jewelry is

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Speaker 1: genuinely bake light jewelry or not? And there's some wacky

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Speaker 1: little tests that you can do, and the company's slogan

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Speaker 1: became quote the material of a thousand uses, and its

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Speaker 1: logo was the infinity symbol to represent its seemingly endless possibilities.

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Speaker 1: And before we get on to start of talking a

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Speaker 1: little bit about Dr Leo Bakeland as a person, we're

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Speaker 1: gonna have a quick word from a sponsor. Alright, So

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Speaker 1: back to talking about Dr Bakeland. While he was busily

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Speaker 1: shifting the world of applied chemistry forward, he was also

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Speaker 1: working on really fully embracing life in the United States,

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Speaker 1: and his diaries reflect a belief that America was far better,

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Speaker 1: in his opinion, than Europe, and he became a US

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Speaker 1: citizen actually in seven He worked to eliminate his Belgian

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Speaker 1: accent entirely, so it was really important to him to

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Speaker 1: just completely blend in and become fully American. And he

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Speaker 1: even named his son George Washington, after the first US President,

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Speaker 1: so he was pretty on board with US patriotism from

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Speaker 1: a verily very early time of his arrival here. We

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Speaker 1: talked about how his inventions were pretty lucrative, and of

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Speaker 1: course that helps him work on his own projects, but

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Speaker 1: his family also used their good fortune to help other people. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: his wife selene H, who had helped her husband throughout

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Speaker 1: the years as a bookkeeper. Was an accomplished painter of

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Speaker 1: her own h She worked mainly in oil. She focused

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Speaker 1: a lot on landscapes. You can still find some pictures

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Speaker 1: of her paintings online. Uh and she kind of focusing

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Speaker 1: on that love of the arts, founded an after school

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Speaker 1: arts program for children, particularly children whose parents were working,

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Speaker 1: with the motto of quote bathe them, feed them, and

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Speaker 1: give them exposure and experience in the art. The Prospect

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Speaker 1: Settlement House, which served as the base of operations for

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Speaker 1: this program, was open from nineteen o eight until the

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Speaker 1: mid nineteen thirties. Here's a fun anecdote in Dr Bakerland's

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Speaker 1: biography on the Yonkers Historical Society's website, and it has

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Speaker 1: to do with his clothing. He only had one suit,

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Speaker 1: but Selene really wanted him to have more than one suit.

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Speaker 1: But she knew that he would not be willing to

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Speaker 1: pay how much it costs to buy a nice a

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Speaker 1: nice suit, even though they could easily afford it. So

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Speaker 1: she went to a clothing store, picked out a nice

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Speaker 1: suit for him, paid a hundred dollars of the hundred

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Speaker 1: and twenty five dollar price, and then asked that it

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Speaker 1: be put on the window in the window of the

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Speaker 1: shop with the twenty five dollar price tag and sold

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Speaker 1: only to her husband. Yes, so she went home and

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Speaker 1: she told her husband Leo, about this amazing deal on

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Speaker 1: a great suit. I think it was a blue searge suit,

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Speaker 1: and he was incredulous, but just the same he went

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Speaker 1: to the store to investigate his wife's claim and he

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Speaker 1: did end up purchase sing the suit. So Selene Bakerland's

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Speaker 1: plan was a success or. It would have been except

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Speaker 1: for the fact that Dr Bakeland sold the suit on

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Speaker 1: the way home to an admiring neighbor who was a

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Speaker 1: lawyer and offered him seventy five dollars for it. So

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Speaker 1: he was terribly pleased with himself that he made fifty

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Speaker 1: dollars out of this deal. So this may make it

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Speaker 1: sound like he was miserly, and that's not really the case.

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Speaker 1: He just didn't want to spend his money on clothes.

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Speaker 1: For example, he was a really early adopter of driving

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Speaker 1: as a regular mode of transportation, and in seven he

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Speaker 1: drove all over Europe on a tour with his family.

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Speaker 1: He purchased a yacht called the Ion and eventually got

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Speaker 1: in the habit of traveling by yacht back and forth

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Speaker 1: to work, So not so much that he was just

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Speaker 1: hoarding money, but more that he was kind of particular

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Speaker 1: about what he wanted to spend it on. Yeah. Uh,

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Speaker 1: And he's described as a man who was always excited

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Speaker 1: by science and chemistry, but also as being pretty mercurial.

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Speaker 1: He would get pretty bored if he spent too long

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Speaker 1: on anyone project. So it kind of makes sense that

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Speaker 1: he jumped from working on this photography development to working

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Speaker 1: in residents, to working in plastics, to then being really

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Speaker 1: into his cars and boats. So despite all of his

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Speaker 1: many achievements and the significant accumulation of wealth and taking

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Speaker 1: a yacht back and forth to work, he always remained

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Speaker 1: a pretty down to earth man. His granddaughter, also named Selene,

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Speaker 1: said of him, my grandfather in his later years used

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Speaker 1: to love to take the trolley into downtown Yonkers and

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Speaker 1: wander talking to street people. He came from a very

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Speaker 1: poor background and felt a kinship with the poor city folk.

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Speaker 1: Although he was a scientific genius and made a fortune,

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Speaker 1: he disdained the material things and remained a man of

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Speaker 1: simple needs. He was happiest on his boat in old

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Speaker 1: sneakers and white duck pants and shirt. In fact, he

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Speaker 1: wore sneakers when he was formally dressed. I sort of

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Speaker 1: love that. It's sweet. Uh yeah, I think to him

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Speaker 1: spending money on things like his boat in his cars

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Speaker 1: that made perfect sense. That was moving us forward and

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00:21:03,520 --> 00:21:06,720
Speaker 1: they could be used as transportation was really logical and

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Speaker 1: not uh an extravagance. But again not so much the

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Speaker 1: shoes and clothes. Uh. Dr Bakerland retired finally in nineteen

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Speaker 1: thirty nine, and the bake Light Company merged with Union

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Speaker 1: Carbide that year. In late nineteen forty three, Dr Bakerland

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Speaker 1: was admitted to the Craig House Sanitarium and Beacon, New York,

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Speaker 1: and he died of a cerebral hemorrhage there several months later,

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Speaker 1: on February twenty third, nineteen forty four. He was buried

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Speaker 1: in Sleepy Hollow, New York. And he received many honors

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Speaker 1: throughout the years, both when he was still alive and posthumously. So.

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Speaker 1: For example, in nineteen o nine, he was elected president

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Speaker 1: of the Electrochemical Society. In nineteen twelve he became president

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Speaker 1: of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. UH. He was

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Speaker 1: president of another thing, the American Chemical Society in n four.

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Speaker 1: He was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame

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Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy eight, and in nineteen eighty three he

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Speaker 1: was inducted into the Rail of Fame for United States

400
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Speaker 1: Business Leadership. And that's just a small handful. If you

401
00:22:10,760 --> 00:22:12,760
Speaker 1: look at a biography of him that like lists out

402
00:22:12,800 --> 00:22:15,480
Speaker 1: all of his honors, it goes on for pages, because

403
00:22:15,480 --> 00:22:18,920
Speaker 1: he was both as an inventor and a businessman, very

404
00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:24,240
Speaker 1: very smart, and pretty ingenious. His wife, Selene, died almost

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Speaker 1: thirteen years to the day after he did, on February

406
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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty seven. She was living in one of the

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00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:34,320
Speaker 1: family's homes in Coconut Grove, Florida at the time, and

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Speaker 1: her remains were transported to Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in New

409
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Speaker 1: York to be interred near her husband. The family estate

410
00:22:41,720 --> 00:22:44,359
Speaker 1: at Snug Rock, unfortunately, was burned to the ground in

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Speaker 1: a fire in nineteen fifty seven. As for bakelite, it

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Speaker 1: was eventually surpassed by other materials, and one of the

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00:22:50,760 --> 00:22:54,359
Speaker 1: big reasons was limitations that come along with coloring. This

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00:22:54,560 --> 00:22:57,920
Speaker 1: plastic bi collects natural color is amber, and it can

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00:22:57,960 --> 00:23:02,320
Speaker 1: be pigmented with other tones adding fillers to strengthen the brittle.

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00:23:02,400 --> 00:23:05,480
Speaker 1: The brittle plastic results in kind of muddy opaques though,

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00:23:05,880 --> 00:23:09,359
Speaker 1: and it could never achieve really bright color tones, which

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00:23:09,400 --> 00:23:12,199
Speaker 1: kind of makes me wonder. Um, Like, I for some

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00:23:12,240 --> 00:23:15,919
Speaker 1: reason always picture bake light and kind of a kitchen

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifties kitchen context, and I wonder if I'm actually

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00:23:20,600 --> 00:23:24,240
Speaker 1: confusing it with some other material. Well, if it's in

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00:23:24,400 --> 00:23:28,600
Speaker 1: sort of the tones like the the avocados and even

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00:23:28,640 --> 00:23:31,480
Speaker 1: some of the kind of um duller shades of pink,

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Speaker 1: it might still be baker. I'm thinking the avocados that

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00:23:35,080 --> 00:23:39,480
Speaker 1: like the avocado dull yellow kind of colors exactly, those

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00:23:39,560 --> 00:23:41,879
Speaker 1: very well might be. It's the sort of poppy or

427
00:23:41,960 --> 00:23:45,200
Speaker 1: like a true red, or you know, like a bright blues.

428
00:23:45,480 --> 00:23:48,919
Speaker 1: They couldn't achieve colors like that with it. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: now I will read a little bit of listener mail.

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Speaker 1: This is a short one, but I just wanted to

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Speaker 1: read this one. It's from our listener, Crystal. She says, Hi,

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00:23:56,320 --> 00:23:58,480
Speaker 1: Holly and Tracy, thank you so much for the podcast.

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00:23:58,480 --> 00:24:01,440
Speaker 1: It is delightful. I've the listening for years and recently

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00:24:01,480 --> 00:24:04,159
Speaker 1: discovered a new use for it. I am pregnant with

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00:24:04,200 --> 00:24:06,560
Speaker 1: our first child and have been afflicted with morning sickness.

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00:24:07,080 --> 00:24:08,879
Speaker 1: For me, some of it is mental because I have

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00:24:08,920 --> 00:24:12,960
Speaker 1: some intrusive thoughts about current food aversions, which compound the problem.

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00:24:13,000 --> 00:24:14,760
Speaker 1: I have been turning to the podcast more and more

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00:24:14,840 --> 00:24:17,760
Speaker 1: as a distraction, which has helped me tremendously get through

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00:24:17,800 --> 00:24:20,120
Speaker 1: those rougher moments while I'm at my mostly boring job.

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00:24:20,160 --> 00:24:22,280
Speaker 1: Thanks again, I have a great day. Thank you, Crystal,

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00:24:22,359 --> 00:24:26,000
Speaker 1: and congratulations on your upcoming new person. I hope that

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00:24:26,000 --> 00:24:29,119
Speaker 1: all goes smoothly and delightfully. Okay, and now I have

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00:24:29,160 --> 00:24:32,000
Speaker 1: another one which is also crazy charming. And when I

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00:24:32,040 --> 00:24:33,879
Speaker 1: got it, I think I read it allowed to everybody

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00:24:33,920 --> 00:24:36,359
Speaker 1: in the office. Uh says hello, Holly and Tracy. My

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00:24:36,440 --> 00:24:38,399
Speaker 1: name is Waverley, and I'm just writing to tell you

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00:24:38,440 --> 00:24:41,480
Speaker 1: something you might find funny. I love your podcast, but

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00:24:41,520 --> 00:24:43,560
Speaker 1: I think the only person who likes your podcast more

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00:24:43,600 --> 00:24:46,720
Speaker 1: than me is my girlfriend's bird. He's a dove Church

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00:24:47,359 --> 00:24:49,880
Speaker 1: Church gets lonely sometimes and he'll coop if no one's

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00:24:49,880 --> 00:24:52,240
Speaker 1: around to pay attention to him. The only thing that

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00:24:52,280 --> 00:24:54,480
Speaker 1: seems to keep him entertained while we are gone is

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00:24:54,480 --> 00:24:57,320
Speaker 1: your podcast. As soon as the podcast starts, he will

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00:24:57,320 --> 00:25:01,560
Speaker 1: stop cooing and listen quietly. No, their podcast will satisfy Church,

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00:25:01,600 --> 00:25:04,919
Speaker 1: and I've tried several. Moth Podcast and Welcome to night

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00:25:04,960 --> 00:25:07,320
Speaker 1: Vale are a couple of that. He mentions we also

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00:25:07,359 --> 00:25:09,680
Speaker 1: have to be careful and not play an episode more

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00:25:09,680 --> 00:25:11,879
Speaker 1: than once, because then he will not be quiet. I

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00:25:11,920 --> 00:25:15,960
Speaker 1: hope you enjoyed hearing about one of your more unusual fans. Uh.

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00:25:16,119 --> 00:25:18,560
Speaker 1: That is the cutest thing I've ever heard, so high Church,

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00:25:18,720 --> 00:25:22,560
Speaker 1: If you're listening, I just thought that was terribly sweet.

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00:25:22,960 --> 00:25:25,080
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for sharing that with us. It

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00:25:25,160 --> 00:25:27,840
Speaker 1: really did delight me to new end. Uh. If you

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00:25:28,320 --> 00:25:30,440
Speaker 1: would like to write to us, you can do so

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00:25:30,600 --> 00:25:33,320
Speaker 1: at History Podcast at house to works dot com. You

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00:25:33,320 --> 00:25:35,800
Speaker 1: can also connect with us on Twitter at misst in history,

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00:25:35,840 --> 00:25:39,320
Speaker 1: at Facebook dot com, slash missed in history, used in

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00:25:39,400 --> 00:25:41,960
Speaker 1: history dot tumbler dot com, and on pinterest dot com

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00:25:42,000 --> 00:25:44,919
Speaker 1: slash miss in history. We also have a spreadshirt store

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00:25:45,119 --> 00:25:47,639
Speaker 1: at missed in History dot spreadshirt dot com, so you

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00:25:47,680 --> 00:25:51,600
Speaker 1: can get t shirts and bags and phone covers and

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00:25:51,760 --> 00:25:54,080
Speaker 1: all manner of other goodies. If you had like a

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00:25:54,119 --> 00:25:56,120
Speaker 1: research a little bit more about what we talked about today,

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00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:57,919
Speaker 1: you can go to our parents site, how Stuff Works

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00:25:58,440 --> 00:26:01,200
Speaker 1: do a search for sticks and you'll get an article

477
00:26:01,240 --> 00:26:05,439
Speaker 1: called how plastics Work. You can also research almost anything

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00:26:05,480 --> 00:26:07,040
Speaker 1: your mind can conjure there. If you would like to

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00:26:07,119 --> 00:26:09,760
Speaker 1: visit us in our home base on the web that

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00:26:09,960 --> 00:26:12,000
Speaker 1: is missed in history dot com, or we have all

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00:26:12,040 --> 00:26:14,480
Speaker 1: of our episodes with a full archive. We have show

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00:26:14,520 --> 00:26:16,720
Speaker 1: notes for any of the episodes since Tracy and I

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00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:18,439
Speaker 1: have been working on the show, as well as the

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00:26:18,440 --> 00:26:20,479
Speaker 1: occasional blog post, So we hope you visit us at

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00:26:20,520 --> 00:26:22,760
Speaker 1: mist in history dot com and how stone works dot

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00:26:22,760 --> 00:26:29,160
Speaker 1: com for more on this and thousands of other topics.

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00:26:29,200 --> 00:26:42,960
Speaker 1: Because it has to have works dot com