- Do you ever just stare at something that you use everyday and think, "Hmm, I wonder where this came from?" Well, the answer might just surprise you. - I wonder where this tomato came from. - As it turns out, some of the things that we use on a regular basis
that we're all familiar with did not start out the way that
we know and use them today, and some of these things
have weird, ridiculous, or straight up awkward histories that are so strange, they will shock you. So, let's discover what these things are. Here are ten everyday
items with amazing origins. Number one is the chainsaw. You might be surprised to learn that while our first item is usually
used to kill trees, its initial function
was to help give life. The chainsaw was first
invented around 1830 by Dr. Bernard Heine. A German orthopedist, Dr. Heine
created the mechanical tool after constantly seeing complications when assisting female patients
while they give birth. This invention, which he
originally dubbed the osteotome, had small rotating chain links, which carried tiny angled metal teeth perfect for cutting through bone. The original purpose of it was to widen a woman's pelvis in
order to make childbirth smoother and easier on the mother. The bone chainsaw, as it was later called, was operated by hand, by turning a handle which spun the chain. Later on, this invention was
used to remove diseased bone, and it wasn't until the
1920s that chainsaws became popular tree clearing machines. And exactly what year did directors decide that the chainsaw was
going to become terrifying? 'Cause it's Jason's weapon of choice. Number two is Listerine. Whenever I'm out of mouthwash, I always turn to my trusty
backup liquid, floor cleaner. After all, that's what
Listerine used to be. Long before the antiseptic
mouthwash product held the slogan, "Kills
germs that cause bad breath," Listerine was used for a number of things that were quite different from
what we use them for today. Invented by a Missouri chemist
named Joseph Lawrence in 1879 Listerine was originally a
powerful surgical antiseptic. It was for this use that
the product got its name, and it was Joseph Lister,
a pioneer in the field of antiseptic surgery, that
Lawrence named it after. Listerine would go on to
be used in the early 1900s as both a floor cleaner and,
get this, a cure for gonorrhea. Wait, which one's gonorrhea? Is that the one that hurts
when it pees or the itchy one? I'm just glad I don't know. Then, in the 1920s, it
became known as a substance that could kill bad breath,
and the rest is history. Though, it should be said
that having bad breath didn't seem to be that big of a deal until Listerine's print
ads claimed that it was. Way to create a problem and solve it, floor cleaning mouthwash! Number three is Silly Putty. Everyone's heard of Silly Putty, that squishy, bouncy,
newspaper print lifting goop of awesomeness that
puts smiles on the faces of millions of kids around the world. But incredibly, this wacky slime owes its creation to the American government. During the second World
War, after Japan invaded a number of countries
that produced rubber, a shortage hit the United States. Since they needed the
material for everything from rafts to tires to
boots, this was a big deal. So, the government hired
a bunch of scientists to develop synthetic rubber, one of those scientists
being James Wright. Wright found what he
thought was the solution by mixing silicone oil and boric acid. The result was Silly Putty, a substance that actually
serves no military purpose, but kids around the world
would eventually come to love. Imagine that. Something that was made to help a war brought fun and smiles
to kids' faces instead. It's awesome. Number four is Vaseline. Discovered by Robert Augustus Chesebrough at only 22 years old, Vaseline is a petroleum
jelly based product that today has its name on a
number of different products, from soaps to skin creams. Oh, but in case you didn't know, that clear gunk that you use on your body is actually a byproduct of oil drilling. In 1859, Chesebrough
met with some oil barons in Titusville, Pennsylvania, who explained a certain obstacle that
they'd been dealing with in regards to their oil rigs. It turns out that the drills
that they were working with were constantly getting gummed
up with a waxy substance which they referred to as rod wax. Fascinated by it, Chesebrough
took a sample of it back to his hometown of
Brooklyn, New York to be tested, and ten years later, this gunk, which Chesebrough named Vaseline, was marketed as a healing agent. He toured the United States
acting like a masochist as he cut and burned himself to let the medicinal oil do its work. He even claimed to eat
a spoonful everyday as, according to him, it prolonged his life. Okay, that's just nasty, gunkin' up your body with that stuff. Leave it on the outside, baby. Number five are graham crackers. Oh, the irony of the graham cracker. Who would have thought that
the bread replacement on your delicious s'mores sandwich
was actually invented with the purpose of stopping the good times? So to speak. Sylvester Graham was a
Presbyterian minister and dietary reformer who believed it was God's intention for mankind to live a dull life with as few
pleasures as possible. So, in accordance with that belief, he lived by the rule that
eating only whole wheats ground coarsely at home was allowed. Some of his followers
believing in his preachings of minimizing pleasure invented a cracker that they felt was perfectly
in line with these rules, as it was without any
fun or flavor whatsoever, a plain, dry, crumby cracker
that they affectionately named after their ridiculously boring leader. The hope was that the graham
cracker would reduce libido and decrease people's sexy fun times. Of course, then, the s'more was invented, and I'm guessing that they all cried because those things are
made of nothing but awesome. Number six is Kotex. Okay, Matt, you're an adult
male, you can talk about this. Tampons!
Okay, nailed it. Believe it or not,
Kotex, one of the world's leading brands of
feminine hygiene products, didn't start out that way at all. In fact, their parent company started out making bandages for wounded
soldiers during World War I. After the war ended on
November 11th, 1918, wounds became scarce, and thus, the need for bandages did, as well. This left Kimberly-Clark,
the company that owns the Kotex brand, with a
large excess of CelluCotton, the wood pulp fiber used
in making the bandages. Then, in 1920, the company came up with a new use for the absorbent material. Developing an alternative to
rival Johnson and Johnson's disposable pads, the Kotex brand was born. Number seven is bubble wrap. Ah, bubble wrap, so satisfying to pop. The world became obsessed
with doing just that back in the 1960s, but for its popularity, this super satisfying package filler owes just as a big a thank you
to interior decorators as it does the postal service. That's because bubble wrap
started out as 3D wallpaper that lined the walls of a
garage in Hawthorne, New Jersey. Initially created by sealing
two shower curtains together and leaving dozens of
air pockets in between, bubble wrap was invented by
Alfred Fielding, an engineer, and his partner, Marc Chavannes, in 1957. At first, the two men
considered their invention a failure in decorating
with a space age motif, as nobody wanted to buy
their poppable wallpaper. They then tried selling it
as greenhouse insulation, but that didn't sell either. It wasn't until 1960
that the two men founded Sealed Air Corp, and their invention began lining packages instead
of their own garage. Nothing more satisfying
than bubble wrap, pop pop. Number eight is the bra. It's actually a common belief
that the bra was invented by a man to make women's
breasts look more pleasing or to show off a man's
control over women by making them wear something
incredibly uncomfortable. But, bras were actually
invented in 1910 by Mary Phelps Jacob as a way
to free her fellow women. Specifically, it was created to replace the incredibly uncomfortable corsets that men had told them to wear, which were insanely popular between the 16th and 19th centuries. While Mary managed to secure a patent for her invention in 1914, it was actually the first World War that
got business booming. As the war created a metal shortage, the corset's days all but came to an end. Even those opposed to
wearing the undergarment had little choice but to turn to the bra. So, the bra is no symbol
of male oppression, as millions still believe, but instead, in a way, is actually a
symbol of women's liberation. Number nine is chocolate milk. How we came to be able to enjoy this incredible drink is pretty unreal. Between 1687 and 1688,
Irish botanist, naturalist, and collector, Sir Hans
Sloane, became the personal in house physician to
the governor of Jamaica. While traveling through the country, the doctor was given a
cocoa drink by the locals that they considered a delicacy. A mixture of cocoa and water,
Sloane found it delicious, though he quickly discovered
that it did not agree very well with his stomach
and he became very nauseous. But not wanting to give up
on the tasty, tasty beverage, he decided to mix the cocoa
with milk instead of water, and presto, chocolate milk was born. Returning with the tasty
new beverage to the UK, Sloane actually initially sold it in apothecaries as medicine. Moooove over, 'cause this is delicious. And number ten is the
automatic transmission. Let's switch gears for a
moment for this last one. Back in the 1950s, it was
super manly to have a car, and it was especially manly if that car contained as many buttons
and gadgets as possible. But driving a car like a
man meant driving stick, with what we call today a
standard or manual transmission. Surprisingly, with automobile
manufacturers worried that men would be insulted by offering a car that helped them drive by itself, vehicles with automatic
transmissions were actually originally marketed towards women. Now, back then, it was
rare for women of the house to make a big decision, like buying a car, so when I say they were
marketed towards women, I really mean the wives of men. Yeah, the 1950s were super sexist. Ads claiming that men should
buy an automatic car for the little lady in their
life were pretty common, some going as far as to
claim that women are already so distracted that they need
all the help that they can get. Of course, today, could literally put a company out of business, but when the automatic transmission was introduced to the market, apparently it became the norm. So those were ten crazy
origins of everyday items. But as always, I want to know from you, is there something else that
we use in our everyday lives that started out as something else? Leave your response below, because I'll be reading through them and I'm going to pin the
best comment to the top. Thank you guys so much
for coming by today. If you enjoyed this, make
sure you hit that like button, and remember to come back tomorrow at exactly 3PM eastern standard time, because I'll have a
brand new video for you. I will see you then. Bye!
