Inventions and What They Were Originally Invented For
There are things which were invented to be used differently than we use them for today. Take Velveeta for example it was invented by the Monroe Cheese Company in 1918. Its purpose was not to be sold as cheese to the public. Cheese came in wheels and sometimes there were gaps in those wheels and Velveeta was meant to fill in the gaps. I guess when someone purchased a wheel of American cheese, they didn’t realize some of it, though not a lot, was Velveeta. The Kraft Company had their eye on this product. In 1927 they purchased it and then marketed it, calling it a healthier version of cheese and today you can find it in a lot of products and also in slices and blocks.
In 1917 a company named Converse decided to make a type of shoe for basketball players. It was supposed to be a lot more flexible, lighter and allow the players more agility. What happened next is history. People who didn’t play basketball decided these were comfortable shoes and began to wear them and today if I were to guess, I would say more people wear sneakers than wear shoes.
One of the most popular drinks on the planet is Coca-Cola. How many times has one of us being tired and thirsty just reached for a can or bottle of Coke. Coke is so famous many firms have tried to get their secret formula but none have succeeded. The Coke formula is one of the most closely guarded things on earth and if companies guarded our data the way the Coca-Cola Company guards their formula, we wouldn’t have any problems. But Coca-Cola was not always a soft drink. Coke was invented by Dr. John Pemberton. He had been seriously injured in a battle and was given morphine and became seriously addicted to it and invented Coke as a cure. It originally contained alcohol and an extract from the cocoa leaf. In 1903 cocaine was removed from the drink and what was left was what we drink today.
How many people love to sit in their favorite chair and squeeze bubble wrap and listen to it pop? For some strange reason many people find this relaxing, but I am not one of them. Many times, when we receive a package it is wrapped in this stuff, but bubble wrap didn’t start out as being wrapping for shipments. As hard as it may be to believe bubble wrap was originally sold as wallpaper. Can you imagine having an entire room with this stuff pasted on your walls? It seems almost laughable today doesn’t it?
I suppose I have a duty, since I talked about Coca-Cola to tell you how 7-Up started. It doesn’t seem to be as popular today as it was a couple of decades ago since there is much more competition out there against it. When it started out it was known as Bib-Label Litigated Lemon-Lime Soda. The soda not only contained lithium when it was invented, but had lithium in it up until 1950. Lithium was used for mood disorders. No one was taking this soda for a refreshment before 1950 because it was a medicine.
The chainsaw had a sort of gruesome beginning. We all know if you want to cut to a tree limb or cut up some firewood, it makes the job a lot easier. Surgeons were looking for a way to cut bone which was a lot easier, and the chainsaw was originally invented to be used during operations. Since then it has found many other uses.
In 1933 two people must have figured there had to be an easier way to clean their wallpaper. After a little experimentation they invented Play-Doh. It seems to be good at getting soot off the walls. It’s formula was cheap and easy to make since the only ingredients that were used were flower, water and salt. It was said it ran into a problem when people felt they didn’t need it for this purpose anymore with the advent of vinyl wallpaper which could be cleaned with just soap and water. In 1949 a youngster discovered it made a great modeling clay. In 1956 it went on the market again and the rest is history.
It is said the necktie, which is worn by men as a sort of piece of formal wear may have been invented during the Thirty Years War. Croatian soldiers who were fighting in that war wore something similar around their necks to allow them to identify each other on the battlefield. There are people who dispute this and claim it might’ve been worn by others to keep their neck warm.
It seems every woman loves their high-heeled shoes. But were high-heeled shoes always for women? Actually no. They were invented in the sixteenth century so that Persian cavalry soldiers could improve their stability when they shot their bows as they rode on their horses. They were never meant to wear while walking.
Today no gym worth their salt would be without a treadmill. The truth is the treadmill was invented to get work out of prisoners. It was invented in 1818 so that prisoners might walk on it while holding onto a handrail and this contraption powered a grain mill. It was sort of like a hamster on a wheel.
Pacemakers have kept a lot of people alive, but did you know that was not what they were originally invented for? The original invention was merely a recorder which recorded heart sounds. It wasn’t until sometime later inventors realized a pacemaker could do so much more.
Most houses have at least one box of Kleenex available or another similar product. These tissues have many uses, but when they were originally invented, they only had one and that was to wipe off cold cream off the faces of women. It seems years ago women used a lot more of the stuff than they do today and as time went by many more uses were found for the tissues.
Most of us have at least one corkscrew in the house. We have them even if we don’t open wine bottles, although I can’t think of much else one would use one for. You certainly wouldn’t want to use one for what it was originally invented for. I wonder how many people could guess why the corkscrew was invented? I have to admit I was surprised myself when I found out the answer to that question. If one looks at a corkscrew without any preconceived notion of what it is, it looks a little gruesome and maybe it should, because it was invented to remove bullets from wounds.
