Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Manky's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Humans have become very good at a lot
Speaker 1: of things over the years. Our use of language, both
Speaker 1: spoken and written, has allowed us to pass knowledge from
Speaker 1: one generation to the next, helping us become masters of
Speaker 1: many useful skills over time, cooking, hunting, building devices that
Speaker 1: help improve our lives and overcome challenges. In fact, our
Speaker 1: inventiveness is possibly the most defining qity we have. We
Speaker 1: as a species are incapable of flights or spending long
Speaker 1: periods of time underwater, and yet we've built contraptions that
Speaker 1: allow us to do both. We've improved the quality of
Speaker 1: our food, our medicine, and our response to natural disasters
Speaker 1: and epidemics. We really are quite inventive, But right at
Speaker 1: the top of our list of skills is something deserving
Speaker 1: of less praise. We are tragically good at war. In fact,
Speaker 1: humans have been battling each other for so long that
Speaker 1: some of the most ancient mythologies on the planet include
Speaker 1: a god of war. It seems that there has always
Speaker 1: been warfare, but rather than invent our way out of it,
Speaker 1: we've become really good at finding new ways to do
Speaker 1: it better or worse. The Romans understood this very well,
Speaker 1: and while they might not have invented one particular weapon,
Speaker 1: they spread its use far and wide. It was a
Speaker 1: small object, easily lifted that could be thrown into hordes
Speaker 1: of enemy troops, causing widespread damage when they exploded, sending
Speaker 1: out shrapnel that could turn the tide of battle in
Speaker 1: their favor. In the eleventh century, German forces serving under
Speaker 1: Emperor Henry the First found themselves defending a fortress against
Speaker 1: French troops from the rain. In a desperate attempt to
Speaker 1: send their attackers running, the Germans picked up the same
Speaker 1: weapon and tossed it over their walls, and it worked.
Speaker 1: Its usefulness spread over the years, reaching most of Europe.
Speaker 1: King Richard actually employed the use of catapults to launch
Speaker 1: the weapon deep into enemy encampments. In the hundreds, during
Speaker 1: a battle between Portugal and the Moors, the weapon was
Speaker 1: used with great success, and towards the end of the
Speaker 1: Thirty Years War, defenders of a walled city in Bavaria
Speaker 1: used their own version of these weapons to toss them
Speaker 1: over the walls, inflicting massive damage on the Swedish army
Speaker 1: trying to attack them. Covered in wounds, the Swedes retreated.
Speaker 1: There are even stories of sailors using this weapon during
Speaker 1: naval battles. One or two brave souls would climb up
Speaker 1: to the highest point on their ships, rigging and then
Speaker 1: tossed the weapon down onto the enemy vessel, and the
Speaker 1: destruction it caused would often give the smaller ships an
Speaker 1: advantage over much more threatening attackers. Now, I do need
Speaker 1: to stop and point out that this is a weapon
Speaker 1: that saw very little advancement over the centuries. While firearms
Speaker 1: have seemingly evolved from the Stone Age to the Space
Speaker 1: Age in terms of usability and effectiveness, this ancient weapon
Speaker 1: has stayed pretty much the same. But there have been
Speaker 1: some creative uses of it throughout history. Although typically thrown
Speaker 1: by soldiers or defenders, some people have actually tried using
Speaker 1: this weapon in new and inventive ways. Some castles in
Speaker 1: England whales in Scotland were known to embed the weapon
Speaker 1: directly inside their walls, knowing that attackers would set it
Speaker 1: off and harm themselves in the process. Other armies developed
Speaker 1: smaller delivery devices, loading blow pipes with the dangerous contents
Speaker 1: of these bombs and shooting them at their enemies in
Speaker 1: close range combat. And in the fourteenth century, one European
Speaker 1: weapons designer created a sort of gatling gun catapult that
Speaker 1: spun around and fired off a constant barrage of their payload. Thankfully,
Speaker 1: modern armies no longer used this weapon in the battles
Speaker 1: they fight, something I think soldiers on both sides can
Speaker 1: be thankful for. You see, it was the sort of
Speaker 1: weapon that could backfire easily, harming both the people who
Speaker 1: are targeted as well as those doing the targeting. Plus,
Speaker 1: we've just decided there are more effective ways of defending
Speaker 1: ourselves than throwing a delicious food source at our enemies,
Speaker 1: especially when we run the risk of getting stung in
Speaker 1: the process. That ancient weapon of choice, often thrown over
Speaker 1: walls into crowds of attacking soldiers, the beehive. Can I
Speaker 1: confess something to you. It's something I'm embarrassed about, even
Speaker 1: though it happened almost thirty years ago. You see, despite
Speaker 1: being an above average student in high school, I nearly
Speaker 1: failed in one subject, chemistry. Maybe I shouldn't feel so
Speaker 1: badly about that. I know a ton of people who
Speaker 1: have told me the same thing. Chemistry, even the basic stuff,
Speaker 1: is tricky and it takes a special mind to master
Speaker 1: the rules and systems inside it. As far as I'm concerned,
Speaker 1: those who go on to study it in college, let
Speaker 1: alone grad school, are the closest thing to wizards to
Speaker 1: walk the earth. But there's no denying the power of chemistry.
Speaker 1: Right If it wasn't for smart people trying out new ideas,
Speaker 1: we wouldn't have super glue, or penicillin or the tiny
Speaker 1: glowing rectangle you're using to listen to this story right now,
Speaker 1: Chemistry has changed the world. So while it's a tough
Speaker 1: subject for most students, let's be grateful for those who
Speaker 1: excel at it, students like Stephanie. Stephanie was born in
Speaker 1: ninety three to parents who had immigrated to Pittsburgh from
Speaker 1: pole Land, and she discovered an early love of the
Speaker 1: natural world. This was thanks in part to her father,
Speaker 1: who worked as a naturalist, and even though he passed
Speaker 1: away when she was just ten, that interest never went away.
Speaker 1: In six she graduated with a degree in chemistry from
Speaker 1: Carnegie Mellon University and then took a pause. Medical school
Speaker 1: was on her list of goals, but she needed to
Speaker 1: earn the money to pay for it first, so she
Speaker 1: took a job as a chemist at DuPont, putting her
Speaker 1: bright mind and her new degree to work. Once settled there,
Speaker 1: she was put onto DuPont's Pioneer Research Laboratory team, their
Speaker 1: mission to find a lightweight fiber that was stronger than steel.
Speaker 1: You see, at that point, most automobile tires were made
Speaker 1: of rubber and reinforced with steel wire. It was effective,
Speaker 1: but it added a lot of weight, and DuPont understood
Speaker 1: that chemistry might hold the answer. Now Stephanie had no
Speaker 1: plans to stick around. Medical school was where she wanted
Speaker 1: to be, but she was the sort of person who
Speaker 1: found chemistry fun if you can believe that, And soon enough,
Speaker 1: a summer became a year, and then two. In nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty nine, her work won her a publication award from
Speaker 1: the American Chemical Society. She had demonstrated how to produce
Speaker 1: a nylon rope inside a beaker of chemicals, not earth
Speaker 1: shaking on its own, but Stephanie did it at room temperature.
Speaker 1: And maybe you're thinking to yourself, wait, I've seen science
Speaker 1: teachers do this in school, and you'd be right. But
Speaker 1: it was Stephanie who taught them all how to do it.
Speaker 1: Stephanie would end up filing twenty eight patents over her
Speaker 1: four decades at DuPont while building a legendary career as
Speaker 1: a chemist, problem solver, and innovator. Not bad for a job.
Speaker 1: She never intended to keep just a way stop on
Speaker 1: her journey toward a medical degree that could have helped
Speaker 1: her save lives, but thankfully one of her inventions made
Speaker 1: up for all of that. In nineteen sixty four, the
Speaker 1: US was about to face a gasoline shortage, and one
Speaker 1: way to help cars is less gas was to reduce
Speaker 1: their weight, which brought the tire project back to her desk.
Speaker 1: If they could find a lighter material to replace that
Speaker 1: steel wire inside them, tires would become more efficient. Now
Speaker 1: I'm not going to go into the chemistry of her solution.
Speaker 1: You can listen to the first twenty seconds of this
Speaker 1: story for my reasons why. Plus the terminology is so
Speaker 1: complex that would put my tongue into nuts, but in
Speaker 1: Layman's terms, that get us into the ballpark. What Stephanie
Speaker 1: did was recognize some potential in something that others would
Speaker 1: have considered a mistake. Most nylon fibers were made by
Speaker 1: heating the polymers and then running the clear solution through
Speaker 1: a spinneret a sort of hypodermic needle for polymer solutions.
Speaker 1: The results were stiff fibers that broke fairly easily, but
Speaker 1: Stephanie created a solution that wasn't clear. In fact, she
Speaker 1: later described it as sort of like buttermilk, and when
Speaker 1: run through the spinnerett, this new recipe, for lack of
Speaker 1: a better term, produced a fiber that was five times
Speaker 1: stronger than steel. After a brief stint inside tires, this
Speaker 1: new polymer found its way into more flexible items, rope,
Speaker 1: fabric for sales, and even bicycle tires. But it was
Speaker 1: one particular item of clothing that changed history. Stephanie Kulec
Speaker 1: might not have made it to medical school, earned her degree,
Speaker 1: and gone into practice, saving lives and hospitals everywhere in America,
Speaker 1: but she invented something that has kept a lot of
Speaker 1: people out of the hospital ever since. The lightweight incredibly strong,
Speaker 1: flexible and adaptable material that we used today in bulletproof
Speaker 1: vests Kevlar. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of
Speaker 1: the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or learn more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast
Speaker 1: dot com. The show was created by me Aaron Manky
Speaker 1: in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make another award
Speaker 1: winning show called Lore, which is a podcast, book series,
Speaker 1: and television show, and you can learn all about it
Speaker 1: over at the World of Lore dot com. And until
Speaker 1: next time, stay curious. Yeah,