Elastics: Where God and Science Smooch

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we're speaking with the hottest names in the culture.

“Like, Swaley, do you realize how legendary you are?”

I appreciate it. I've seen him, and I'm like, "Man, I still got so much more to do." Like, "Friends." He's got like 30 albums. We got like five right now.

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Up next, we have our 2017 episode on Elastics. It's one of those episodes like ballpoint pens or zippers where the topic sounds super boring, but it actually turns out to be super interesting. And this episode as a bonus, as a surprising amount of discussion on pirates for a show on things that snap back when you pull them.

Enjoy feeling your brain in large. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry, this is stuff you should know. The sick edition, the annual sick edition. You aren't well, my friend.

No, and it really stinks too Chuck because like, I like to think that I take pretty good care of myself so to be able to be filled not once but twice in just a few months if I'm stupid bug, it's irritating to me. I know, you get mad every time you get sick though just so you know.

I do. I hadn't noticed that actually. Uh, my wife is the same way. Well, it's not fun. I know, but she gets like kind of, yeah, you both get a little angry, like,

why did this happen to me? I get more pitiful, like, oh, somebody helped me. Oh, I've got to take it on on too, listen to this. So does that mean people have the next like 8 episodes to look forward to this or? No, no, man. No way.

This is it. This is it right here. I think actually yesterday might have been the worst day. Oh, we'll good. Yeah.

That mean today was a close second but we'll find out.

Yeah, it is, man. I got to be a pro, man. I got to get well. The show must go on. So today, Chuck, Charles, we're talking elastic. Yeah.

Did you know much about this? No, I thought this is actually super interesting and it also contained two, uh, what we like to call, um, dinner party factoids that people can bust out. We need a jingle that says that. So we can play it when, when it comes up.

Yeah, I mean, there's lots of cool stuff in here. And please don't correct us on factoid because, oh, yeah. I mean, that's so 2009 and 11 maybe. Exactly. But yeah, two really cool facts in here that I think people can just keep in their

hip pocket. Okay. Now you go, so until we get a jingle made, I'll bet no will make one for us.

“But until we do maybe you should, you want to practice one?”

Um, geez. What's a good dinner party jingle? It should, it should be like wine glasses and plates and forks and things, clinking. Right. And then maybe like this Orwellian voice going dinner party.

Factoid. Yeah, here we are eight years in still evolving. Yeah. It's a working progress. Okay.

So we're talking elastic Chuck. I didn't know that much about it either. And this article written by one William Harris.

Yeah, it is. It makes pretty good point, um, that it's just one of those things, specifically say like a rubber band. You just kind of think it's always been around. And, you know, you've always, you just think like, you know,

elastic waist bands have been around for eons.

There's basically the second thing discovered after fire is what I've always thought.

Yeah, it's still today. Since Adam first popped Eve's bra strap. Right. It's been around. Yeah, you think that's actually not the case at all.

It's a elastic itself. And elastic we should say is basically any rubber natural or synthetic. Uh, thread woven with another kind of fabric. Usually like say cotton or dial on or whatever that produces a stretchy fabric. That's elastic, right?

“Yeah, like I think a lot of people don't even realize if they took their.”

Underwear waistband don't do this because then you ruined it. But maybe if you have an old pair, if you just kind of cut it, you would see these these little elastic threads. It's all it is. Yes, sure.

Little rubber bands. Or, or you could go to like a thrift store or something buy a pair and then cut those. If you're buying thrift store underwear, then I don't know. I wouldn't recommend that. Yeah.

I don't think they even sell it actually. They do. Would really? Yep. Used underwear.

Yes. Wow. So 10% skin free. That's probably that's got to be one of the more difficult tasks. It's getting those things just prepared for resale.

You know? Yeah. I don't want to be unprepared for resale due to today. Anyway, when you do, if you cut it open, if you look very closely, have you ever done this?

Have you ever seen like an elastic waistband come? Come loose? Sure. As you've got, if you look really closely, you can be like doing the link to like the little threads that are sticking out. Because some just hang the link and loose, let's cotton.

Nobody cares about that. But the ones that are just kind of still sticking out a little bit and you can throw them. That's the rubber or natural or synthetic rubber that gives that elastic its stretchiness. And again, this is a fairly recent invention. Especially if you're talking about waistbands for underpants.

Yeah. And especially if you're talking about elastic that really kind of worked, we're two sort of dives into making elastic in one quite a long time ago. And then one more recently that obviously worked much better.

And basically the reason it worked much more better, more recently,

is better techniques to making rubber and then better techniques, changing that rubber into something that you could actually use like in a waistband. Right, exactly. But we've known about rubber for a very long time. Since, well, I should say those of us in the west have known about it for a very long time.

Those indigenous peoples of the Amazon have known about it even longer. But I interrupted you were talking about waistbands.

“Oh, okay, so yeah, so with underwear waistbands in particular, right?”

Yes. Apparently humans have felt shame for thousands of years because the oldest pair of underwear, identifiable underwear, are 7,000 years old. And the bottom it good will. Right, last week.

Yep. So these, this underwear originally, well, even before that, I should say, there was something called breech cloth.

And that was just basically strips of leather that just kind of hung down and covered your junk.

Maybe kept the nats out, that kind of thing, right? Or kept them in. Yeah. If it was your things or probably catch some. And those are even older than the first underwear, which would be considered a lowing cloth.

Yeah, of course, which is basically that. And there are lowing cloths that are at least 5,000 years or 7,000 years old. And they are basically a linen diaper that is folded in a certain way, worn by grownups, including very famously most recently Gandhi used to wear a lowing cloth everywhere. Well, the dotty.

But it's a lowing cloth, no matter what you call it. That's right. So those stuck around for quite a while in the west. And it wasn't until basically the middle ages that someone said, well, we can do better than this.

Yeah. And they brought around these things that are much longer than a lowing cloth. Most of them kind of, for my research, these braids, are AI-ES went below the knee even. Yeah, they were like a cross between a lowing cloth and jams.

Yeah, sort of. It says here that they were laced to the waist and legs, but there may be laced under the waist, but they're also generally kind of rolled over many times at the waist. Right.

“I think to probably tighten it up a bit.”

Yeah. And everyone said great. This is work. Yeah, for a while.

You know, then it went a different way. We should do an entire episode just on courses. I know there's a good article on the side on it. But after braids, what's called the union suit was invented. Well, dinner party, fact. Okay.

There you go. That's good. I never knew. I thought it was called a union suit because it had something somewhere along the line to do with unions. But no.

In fact, the word union suit. Now we know them as long johns, even though long johns are generally two piece. The one piece union suit is called that because it is one piece. It is the union of a top and a bottom undergarment. Yep.

That's right. It's a one piece long john with a flap in the bottom. Uh-huh. They usually button all the way up front from the growing up to the neck. Do you have any of these?

I'm wearing a couple pair right now. Obviously. You just can't see him because they're under my clothes. Do you really have some? No, I have long johns. I've got these one called silky's that work really well.

Oh, yeah. But I don't have a union suit. No. Do you? No.

I don't need more. My brother still got squares by the union suit. Um. I think he has the classic red. And then, of course, they famously have, like you said, the,

the, the either called an access hatch. I've also seen them called a drop seat or a fireman's flap. Yeah. I saw that too. Uh, where you can see that.

Yeah. Where you can unbutton your, uh, you know, because generally you're wearing this out in the cold.

“So you don't want to strip down to the naked if you want to go pee pee or boop boop.”

Right. So you just open the old access hatch and there you have it. Yeah. Now that's, see, that to me makes sense. Um, in the 19th century when the, the union suit was invented.

Today, though, it's like, I guess Scott just likes to add a little panic to it when he has the tinkle, like having to get that flap open. I think he's just, uh, a classicist, not classicist. A, who's someone who's into the classic things? Classicist.

Uh, okay. That sounds like he doesn't like poor people. That's a classic. Okay. That extra stuff makes a bit different.

Okay. He's a classicist then. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

So you should tell him this. Here's another little sub-dinner party factoid. Yeah. Union suits were originally invented for women from what I understand. All right.

And they were invented in response to the corset craze. Because apparently corsets were so at a hand.

“It was basically like, remember our foot binding episode?”

Oh, yeah.

So, but that's basically what women in Europe and the United States and the Western countries

were doing with corsets. They were engaging in what was, um, amounted to foot binding, but with their waist. Right. They were, they were literally deforming themselves. Uh, using corsets.

And there was a, a reformation movement against the corset and against that look. And what it's spawned ultimately was the Union suit, which were so great that member like these are ours now. Right. Yeah.

We should do one of corsets. I assume that they did this because men were like, no more of an hour glass. Right. Yeah. And yeah.

And I think that's where the reformation came out of like just shut up men. Right. Like we're just figured now thanks to you. It is. Uh, well, I hate to pack another dinner party fact right next to the other one.

But that's kind of where we are. So, my second factoid that you should bring up next time you're among friends. Or next time you see an injured friend perhaps is if they're using an ace bandage, ask them what it stands for and they'll say, uh, what do you mean? But it, in fact, is an acronym correct?

Yes, it is and what does it stand for? All cotton elastic, ace. All cotton elastic bandage.

I never knew that until today.

And it's been around since 1918 apparently. Yeah. That the 3M company introduced it. Amazing. Um, and so, so okay.

You've got an ace bandage. Okay. Which is essentially, uh, an elastic waistband. Mm-hmm. Used to, to keep shacks elbow in place, right?

She killed her nail. Yeah. All right. Um, what your weight thickness is. What's crazy is, uh, this is 1918 that that 3M introduced the ace.

Uh-huh. And it took until the 40s before somebody thought, why don't we just, like, attach, like, underpants, a loincloth. Yeah. To that is weird.

Pull it up, snap it in place and be like, oh, baby.

“I mean, the only thing I can think of is because they were tying them.”

And they just figured, well, that works pretty well for now. Yeah. I guess, you know. I mean, that's what, uh, that's what William Harris says.

He says it was basically a sort of fashion inertia.

That's everything was fine. Like you could use buttons or ties or something like that and keep it in place. So who cares? Yeah.

That's right.

“But regardless of what you're talking about here, these fabrics, including elastic,”

are made with a loom. And if you've ever seen a loom at work. Uh-huh. All right. At work.

Yeah.

It's amazing to watch them into work.

You're like, what the hell's this loom doing here? Well, not at your job, but, you know, I know to me, sure. Oh, this is being a wise idea. If you've ever seen a loom doing its thing, it's pretty impressive. Um, and what, I mean, it's really not that complicated either, basically.

All it's doing is allowing these lengthwise threads to be interlaced with widthwise threads. Mm-hmm. The warp in the weft. Yeah, which is not a bad band name, by the way. No, it's not.

Especially like, like, um, proto folk. Yeah, well, that's exactly what it would be. Mm-hmm. There would be at least three guys wearing vests in that band. For sure.

Uh, that may have been woven with a loom.

Yeah, right, you know. And maybe, uh, poca watches with the chains. Oh, totally. Yeah. But that's all loom does.

It goes, you know, it allows this interlacing and take place.

“And that's what's happening with elastic.”

Uh, it just takes the place of the yarn. And it's, uh, well, part of the yarn half of the yarn or portion of the yarn. Well, yeah, because in the, in the case of the waistband, you're obviously introducing other fabrics as well like cotton probably or something else. Yeah, and that's the case with any elastic elastic is.

Again, it's, it's a, it's a, it's a type of fiber woven together with, uh, some sort of rubber and to create this new stretchy, resilient fabric. That's elastic.

You want to take a nose blow break?

Uh, I'm going to die here. Thank you, Charles. Sure. [Music] Hey, I'm How to Cut Be Host of the podcast.

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Yeah, I should say also like, I keep hammering home. What the definition of elastic is.

That's what you think of typically.

“But again, any fabric with fiber of one type and rubber woven together is elastic.”

And that has tons and tons of uses. Oh, sure. Like bungee cords are elastic, right? You know, everything else that's like that is like elastic. Well, you know, in your socks.

A lot of times they'll be, I mean, there's elastic and, you know, we'll get to Spandex later. But that stuff is in many, many, many garments that you wear today. You may not realize that you have this stuff in your clothing. Right. Everything from the neck of your shirt, perhaps to maybe the tongue of your shoes sometimes.

Yeah, fancy shoes. We'll have elastic in them. Those jeans that you wear to Thanksgiving dinner. They have an elastic waist. Oh, I know what you're talking about.

I don't wear those. They're pleated jeans, which is weird looking. That is where button flies. Oh, yeah. So you just go pop.

Yep. Pop a couple out. And you're all set. That's right. You can stuff a lot of extra bits in there.

All right.

“So let's, should we get the way back machine a bit and go back to the 18th and then, I guess, the 19th and 18th centuries, huh?”

Yep. All right. We're pirates. Oh, man. I'm glad you brought that up.

I read this really interesting article. I found it, I think, on long form, but it's from the national endowment for the humanities, like magazine website. And this guy wrote an article about how just thoroughly we misunderstand pirates. Oh, really?

Now our conception of pirates took place basically in one decade between 17, I think, 26 and 36.

And everything we think of as pirates is crammed into that 10 years, everything before and after is totally different from our conception of pirates. And that they were actually very frequently. They were just sailors who would go attack like a vessel in the Indian Ocean for one big hall and then flee to the colonies and buy a bunch of pigs and set up a farm and live as

like upstanding citizens from that point on and some of them were like lieutenant governors. It was a really interesting article that I recommend tremendously, obviously. Did we not cover that in our pirates episode 18 years ago? No, we wouldn't have known that. This is a brand new article, huh?

“I'm sure we just totally fell for everything, right?”

And apparently that's not, like, that's not our fault that this guy's article and idea is pretty new. It's just one of these things historically, everyone kind of bought in on interesting. Yep, it's in me that way. You got it.

All right.

So we're talking pirates here and not just pirates, but sailors explorers, basically anyone

who got on a ship in the 17 and 1800s, early 1800s, and went exploring. Yeah. And they, you know, what they did was they would go off and find things that they didn't have in their home country, say, oh my God, what is this? Let me bring it back.

Yeah. And cinnamon. Remember a cinnamon episode? Yeah. Absolutely.

That's a great example. But one of the things they found in Central and South America was what the French called "Couchuk." Nice. And it's an Indian term meaning weeping wood, and it's basically what they're talking

about, is it an actual rubber tree? Yep. Hey, the Brazilanesis. The rubber tree, which literally oozes milky latex. Yeah.

Naturally. Yeah. And the earlier sailors that encountered the indigenous natives of the Amazon were like, what's that stuff you're like putting out on your outerwear and it's keeping the rain outer?

What's that weird flexible bottle you're using? And they explained it to him and those guys said, awesome. You know who will love this? My fellow Europeans. So they took it back with them.

And then they said, and what are those awesome drugs that you give us and liquid form every night after dinner? They said, oh yeah. That's good. Yeah.

And they went, we'll take some of that home too. Yeah. Can we get it to go back? Yeah. So yeah.

They were already used in the stuff because they found out when it was dried out

basically you could use it for a lot of things.

Like you said bottles, shoes, just like this flexible rubbery material. Yeah. Right. So everything's funky door. This is a brand new thing.

Europe started to go crazy for it. But what they figured out pretty quickly was that you, you couldn't do a lot with it. Right. It was, we'll find out later. Rubber has an unusual natural chemistry and it just so happens that in the normal range

of temperatures outside of the tropics it can tend to fall apart pretty easily.

It has a narrow range of temperatures that allow it's usefulness.

Right. So it's up to above the equator to say like Europe or the United States or whatever. And they did. They thought it was great. They thought it was terrific.

People went crazy for it. Joseph Priestley actually came up with a dinner party factory that I'm sure you'd love to share. Uh, ooh, which one? Oh, you didn't.

This was in one of them? No. I blew mine on the two. Joseph Priestley, who was very famous chemist, Jason Priestley's... Triple great uncle.

“I think he made that same joke in the anesthesia episode.”

Oh, bet we did. Yeah. Because yeah, that's where he popped up. That's right. Thanks for that.

Oh, and the nitrous oxide one. Yeah. Yeah. So he got his hands on some of this because everybody's like, he's the only chemist alive right now.

Give it to him. And he's like, you know what? This is amazing. I'm writing a pencil. And then I'm rubbing this latex.

Oh. Cahachuk. And it's rubbing out the pencil marks. And that gave rise to the term rubber. Oh, that's how the name came around.

Yep. From rubbing. From rubbing out pencil marks. Erasing. Rubber.

Interesting.

“Because remember, the British loved to change everything with an error on the”

end. Like, soccer is actually shortened to association, uh, football, like a soccer. Uh-huh. Became soccer. Right?

There you go. Rubber. That's pretty interesting. I don't know how I screwed it past that one. I love that one.

So it became a big deal. And everyone, um, you know, that had a little money to invest that. Hey, we can make a lot of dough with this stuff. We can transform that into something useful. And I like, let's say, in a garment.

But like you said, they had this problem that was a very narrow range of temperatures where they could find it useful. So a couple of dudes, uh, started working on it. We've talked about Mr. Charles Goodyear before, um, we talked about him and I don't know.

I mean, definitely the good year blamps episode, but um, it seems like, do we not do one in vulcanization? I don't remember. I was looking up rubber or something because some of the stuff in the extra source that I sent you was kind of like, I could write a book.

Talked about this before. Yeah. But we haven't done this entire episode of, we know, definitely not. Okay. If so, then I really am just totally out of my mind.

So Goodyear was one. He was working in the US and then, uh, another guy named Thomas Hancock, uh, an English inventor, partnered with the dude named Charles Macintosh. And they started making raincoats, basically. Yeah.

The Macintosh. The classic Macintosh. Yeah. And so Charles, uh, Thomas Hancock was already pretty well situated to, who's already working on it, right?

Yeah.

But Charles Goodyear, um, had that breakthrough first.

And it was actually a really big deal that he had this breakthrough. And the early 1830s, Charles Goodyear basically became obsessed with cracking the rubber coat. He just knew it could be used to be, uh, made into something useful, right? Yeah.

And he became so personally committed to it. He, uh, all of his investors went away. He went into debtors prison so regularly. He referred to it as his hotel, um, six of his 12 children didn't make it to adulthood. They were just that poor.

Oh, man, they, um, they had to sell their dinnerware so he made plates for him out of rubber. Um, it was really, really rough. So the idea that he had this breakthrough, um, was just enormously rewarding for, right? Unfortunately, as he was shopping this stuff around, this vulcanization process or the

vulcanized rubber, some of it fell into the hands of Thomas Hancock, and he reversed in generative. Yeah. And what he basically discovered was if you slow-cooked latex with sulfur, it could it could basically transform rubber into a very durable material that, uh, it, it, it was

hardy under all kinds of temperature ranges.

It would always snap back.

Yep. Um, well, not always, and forever, which we'll get too later, too. As you know, that waste ban will sometimes leave you disappointed, eventually.

“That's why you end up buying new underwear, um, well, one of a couple of reasons you”

buy new underwear. Uh, let's take it to the thrift store. Yeah, exactly. Uh, but yeah, he, that is what vulcanization is. And, um, Hancock and Macintosh, what they were doing, uh, they didn't crack that code

first, but they, um, they developed, called something called the mass decater. Basically, they had been, been making elastic threads by slicing it from rubber bottles and raw rubber. Mm-hmm. But there was just so much waste.

They developed this machine, uh, called the mass decater. And it would basically chew up this rubber and make it into, uh, meld it together and make it into a big single sheet of material, which was really helpful. Yeah.

Right.

“And, and again, they reverse engineered good years process, went and filed a patent on”

vulcanization. It had a grip him off, like, yes. Holy. Yes. Wow.

Fully. And, um, apparently it was one of those ones like the phone where good year went to go file a patent and found out that, uh, someone else had that Hancock had just a few weeks earlier. Uh, so he took him to court, um, in order to settle, Hancock offered good year 50%

of the patent to drop the lawsuit and good year said, no, and he lost the case in, he died broke. Oh, man. But he was able to, um, he was able to generate enough royalties so that his kids were able to, uh, to live the good, like, thanks to him.

Um, but he, uh, yeah, he got ripped off for sure. And, uh, one other thing about the about Charles Good Year, the good year rubber, or tire and rubber company, he had nothing to do with it. They named it after him and honor of him. Oh, wow.

Yeah. I thought that was pretty cool. Uh, you don't watch the TV show Shark Tank do you? I do not. Uh, I think I've asked you that before.

I, you know, the whole concept right as these people pitch their businesses to them. Yeah. Well, surrounded by sharks swimming. Well, he. That's it.

Now, they pitch them to the sharks and they either invest or they don't, everyone kind of knows the show, but you, I guess. Um, but uh, I'm always at home just yelling at these people when, you know, they'll offer up like 20% of their company. And then they'll get offered an investment from a shark for, you know, and say, but

they want, like, 40% and some of these people like turn around and walk away, which, and one hand, I kind of respect that they don't want to give away that much of their company.

Like, I'm always just thinking, wouldn't you rather own 60% of a $20 million company than

80% of a $3 million company? Yeah.

“Like, sometimes I think pride gets in the way with these people.”

Sure. Yeah. And they don't think about just how big these people can make their company. Yeah. I don't know.

Who's that company, though, that that, um, turned down a billion dollars from either Google or Facebook and just kept at it and now it's my space. No. No. I can't.

It's one of like the big social media brands that you know of, um, that, that, that was just worth gobs more money. Oh, really. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, you know, there's no recipe, like, sometimes it is better to hold on to more of your own company because if it gets big, then you own that much more of it. But that's right.

I'm always kind of like, man, take the money now and run a Steve Miller suggested.

Is he just Steve Miller's the Scientologist? Is he really? Yeah. Boy, he went off on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year. Why did they not, um, vote for nominating him?

No, no, no, he got inducted in, like, basically trash them on his way in and out the door. Why? Oh, you'll just have to read it.

“It's kind of too long to get into, but they, they were none too happy, I think.”

He came across as just a really crappy old guy. Oh, he didn't have, like, a point or anything? Now he had points, but, um, yeah, you don't, you'll just have to check it out. I will, we're already getting sidetracked here. Oh, we've been sidetracked, baby.

So, um, when regardless of who came up with it, even though it was Charles Goodier, once Volcanization was introduced to the world, all of a sudden, all of these dreams of what you could do with a flexible, durable material, thank you with Stan, tremendous pressure and force and heat, um, and cold too, which was a big one, uh, all of a sudden the whole world just opened up.

And, um, what was interesting, Chuck was, because it also dovetailed with the Industrial Revolution Brazil, which was the, the rubber tree capital at the time, went from just being like

this kind of old world colony to basically being one of the most important countries on

the planet, and it all, like, virtually within a year or so. Yeah, and that was true, uh, geez, for a long time until about the mid to late about 1876 when these British businessmen said, I'm going to sneak these rubber tree seeds out, uh, take them back to England, and, uh, we're going to see if these things grow in South East Asia, where we have a lot of British colonies, and it turns out it did.

And just about 35 years later, the center of the global rubber market, uh, shifted to Malaysia, Singapore, and Sri Lanka, as British are thieves in this one. So they kind of, like, totally ripped that off. Yeah. And Southeast Asia was the dominating rubber capital of the world, which was way better for

the brits and the Americans, because we're friends with the brits, um, because that meant that these were, these were British colonies, um, which meant that the access to this rubber was basically unfettered. Yeah. There were no trade deals.

You didn't have to wine and dine a prince or a king or anything like that. You could just be like, really more rubber, please. Yeah.

So everything's going hunky dory, at least as far as the British and Americans are concerned.

The, the rubber supplies being fulfilled, thanks to Malaysia, Singapore Sri Lanka. And, um, it came at no too soon a time, too, because the automobile was introduced around this time. The mass produced automobile, we should say, and those needed for good tires made of rubber. Yeah.

And then World War II really, really increased the need for rubber. Um, I think here it says that in total, the Pentagon said that they needed 32 pounds of rubber for every single ground troop in one way or another. Right. That's amazing.

Yeah.

“And that's why it was such a big deal that the Japanese invaded the Pacific, because the,”

the Pacific theater featured those countries that were the rubber producing capital of the world. Right.

That had been under British control.

And, um, now all of a sudden, our rubber supply was either cut off or in danger. So the United States, led by FDR said, hey, uh, four biggest rubber companies, we're going to get together. And we need to come up with a synthetic rubber, cute, sweet. Right.

So let's get on it. We're all going to split the patent evenly, and, uh, let's get to work. And in 18 months, they had come up with a synthetic rubber. Amazing. Yep.

Uh, and we'll get to synthetics a bit more in a minute, but jumping back to the mid 1800s, the story of the rubber band is pretty interesting.

“Uh, these two chaps, uh, Steven Perry and Thomas Barnabas daft, great name, uh, T.B.D.”

Actually, uh, invented the rubber band, the modern, what we know is a rubber band, because

they started slicing these, uh, they had a rubber tube and started slicing these narrow rings from a vulcanized rubber tube, and they were like, here you go, it's called a rubber band. You can put it around your asparagus. Yeah.

And everyone was super psyched. Yeah, except people who had asparagus, that was a good one, man. Uh, and today, they still kind of do it in the same way, um, rubber band-wise. They create this, uh, they mix this latex together, um, with all these chemicals. It depends on, you know, what kind of rubber band you're making.

And they get this raw rubber compound, uh, into a long hollow tube, slip it over around pipe called the mandrel, expose that to high heat and pressure to vulcanize it, it cures it and then they slice that up into rubber bands. Yep. Pretty neat.

It is pretty neat.

“You want to take a break and then talk some more about, uh, how it's made?”

Yeah, right after this. How to caught V host of the podcast, Joy 101 with Hota Cotby, together. We're going to have meaningful conversations with the world's most fascinating people, like when actress Olivia Munn shared how she overcame fierce health challenges. I've gone through breast cancer and then helped my mother through breast cancer, and that

was more difficult. There's a lot of people who understand post-harmored questions. I was not prepared for post-harming anxiety. Listen to Joy 101 with Hota Cotby on the I Heart Radio App, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

June is Black Music Month, and on the drink champs podcast, we're speaking with the hottest names in the culture, like Swaley. Do you realize how legendary you are? I appreciate it. I've seen it, but I'm like, man, I said, I like so much more to do, like, friends.

He just, like, 30 albums, we just, like, fire right now, like, that's the rate we gotta be going. Yep. That's the good attitude. You also hear stories from industry legends and hip-hop pioneers, like Fab5 Freddy.

I directed when Naz is their only video. Which one? One love. Wow. I literally filmed in his apartment in Queensburg.

His mom's been still up in that apartment. Naz was just beginning to take off. His pop shoes to live near me in Harlem. His dad introduced him to a whole lot of, you know, conscious stuff, and he made a young prodigy.

No matter the era, drink champs brings you the biggest names and the most unfiltered conversations. Listen to drink champs from the Black Effect podcast network on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Mainstream media is full of cruel depictions of the unhoused stories that shane, m blame, and paint the unhoused as a monolith.

We the unhoused is the podcast that's changing that. I'm Theo Henderson, creator, and host, and for years I've created a space where the unhoused and their advocates can tell their own stories. In the last few months alone, I've interviewed on house parents, immigrants, mutual aid organizers, veterans, LGBQTIA plus community, and the policy makers who make the laws

With the unhoused as a two-time webbie and signal award winning show, with many exciting guests on the horizon.

“Even in this week, for my interview with Dr. Jill Wichor, a street doctor, turned in slow”

answer, whose work with the unhoused community has made a huge impact online and in her community. Listen to we the unhoused on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Alright, so we've been talking about rubber, and it's most natural form, and how they transform

that into usable rubbers pretty remarkable, but immediately after World War II, like we were

talking about this creation of synthetic rubber, was probably the second biggest invention

of all time. Well, maybe not of all time. Is that so, though? Yeah, but when it comes to stretchy things for sure. Yeah.

And apparently the World War II research and development produced not just one, but three different types of easily manufactured synthetic rubbers. Yeah. One was a beauty dyeing rubber, another was a styrene beauty dyeing rubber, and that was the one that the government went with for World War II.

Right. It was actually ripped off from a German from the Germans, which they'd come up with something similar previously. Hi. And then there's an effeline propylene monomer, and all three of those make up most of today's

synthetic rubbers. Yeah. And they found that the stuff worked really, really well. Just as good as natural rubber had all that flex resistance. It didn't deteriorate, but eventually it would, again, keep teasing like we're going to get

to that, which we will. But they found it was really well suited to replace rubber. Well, in most applications, in industrial application, like a tire or a fanbell or something like that. It didn't have that resilience that natural rubber has, so there was an issue still.

There was a kink that needed to be worked out. Well, yeah, as far as using it in textiles, for sure. Exactly. And they actually overcame it in 1959, by the way, I mean, DuPont Corporation, who employed two chemists that got to work trying to crack this code, the final code of synthetic

rubber, how to make it flexible and resilient. That's right.

“And they started by using a polymer, a polyurethane, right?”

So, well, we'll talk about polymers in a little bit, but basically they took a polymer,

a urethane-based polymer, and watered it down and forced it through a plate with tiny little holes in it. And what came on the outside were these tiny little threads, yep. And those tiny little threads were a magical creation known as Spandex. The trade name of which originally is Lycra.

Yeah. It's amazing. In Spandex, they found had a lot of great applications, namely, it could accept dies. So it wasn't just the sort of dull white color. You could make it any color you wanted to.

And you could wash it. It didn't absorb a lot of moisture and it would remain really stable when it was washed and dried, you know, kind of normal moderate temperatures. So hey, you can make this weave it into clothing, throw it in the washer, dye it whatever color you want, and you're good to go.

And most importantly, it would snap back, it would retain its original shape, that's right. After being stretched. So, yeah, Spandex changed everything. I didn't realize it was from the '50s, I didn't know that. And William Harris makes it pretty good point.

He says that Spandex might be considered the modern, elastic. Like it is, it's basically the base of anything stretchy that you use today. Yeah, and it's said here, we said it's an all kinds of stuff. They said it's in about 80% of all clothing bought by Americans. So even if you don't think Spandex is in something, it may have a little Spandex in there.

It's in 80% of all clothing bought by Americans, 100% of all Spandex pants bought by Americans. Think about that. That's that for a little while. Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, including jiggings, he points out.

He calls him pajama jeans, but I've always called him jiggings.

Oh, is that the same thing? I believe so, yeah. Interesting. We can't hope so. Emily, when we put him on her daughter, she calls him jazzy pants.

Oh, yeah, that's a good one too.

“But I think that's usually due to the pattern more than the snapback.”

Gotcha. Yeah. So we can sit here and procrastinate for several more minutes if you want. But ultimately, we're going to end up on the chemistry part you realize.

Look at you for this Chuck, I'll throw in some words here and there. So I don't really know chemistry either, but I know both of us crammed on this. Yeah. So forgive us, all you chemists out there, if we get something wrong, let us know. But from what we understand, it's magic.

Yeah. There you go.

“And so rubber, whether it's natural or synthetic, is a polymer, yes, right?”

And it's a specific kind of polymer called an elastomer. It's an elastic polymer as stretchiness and resilience. It's flexible. That's right.

And any kind of polymer is, basically, if you look at the molecular structure of it,

it's made up of these long repeating chains of the same unit over and over again. The unit to call monomers, depending on what the monomer is, that leads to different kinds of polymers. And with elastomers in particular, if you look at some polymers, the structure is bulky and big and compact and it's rigid and heavy and not flexible at all.

Still other kind of polymers, say like a plastic or a resin, are crystalline and structure.

“And they fit so well together, they're also rigid and not very flexible either.”

Yes, then you have elastomers, which are a kind of polymer. And because of their molecular structure, they are super flexible, super stretchy and they snap back into place. Yeah, and normally they're, I mean, they liken it to this article like a coiled like a big mass of snakes. Yeah, but they have this really neat quality. These elastomers, when you apply force to it, the molecule is actually straightened out in the direction that you're pulling it.

And that's sort of the snap back you're talking about. But as soon as you release it, it goes back to that coiled upper arrangement.

Right. When you pull it, when you apply force, they line up basically like those snakes head to tail in one single long line.

It's a scary snake. Yeah, and then when you release it, it goes back into its original form of that, that coiled mass, right? Perfect. Okay. One of the reasons why any kind of rubber natural or synthetic is flexible, a flexible polymer, is because it's um, glass transition temperature is actually pretty low.

Yeah, this is where I kind of just got foggy. So this is, it's as simple as this chuck, a glass transition temperature, it's not a melting point. A melting point is where the substance actually basically just turns into a liquid state, a disordered liquid state. Yeah, the glass transition temperature doesn't affect the, um, the molecular makeup of the substance. Instead, it basically applies this property, flexibility or rigidity.

Yeah, it's as simple as that, right? Okay. And so anything that has a low, um, glass transition temperature, relative to what we have is normal temperatures outside and in the world or in our homes or whatever, is going to be flexible and floppy. Anything with a high glass transition transition temperature is going to be rigid and hard and not flexible. So it's, it just suffice to say anything rubber, whether it's natural or synthetic, has a low glass transition

temperature, so it's flexible under normal temperatures. But even if you, if you took a, um, a piece of rubber, natural rubber and you applied, uh, you applied the temperature of negative 70 degrees Celsius or negative 94 degrees Fahrenheit, it would crystallize. It's below the glass transition temperature. So it would just basically turn rigid and crystallize and ultimately would break apart. And that was part of the problem with those early pre-volcanized rubbers. Yeah.

They would fall apart because the glass transition temperature is not like a, uh, exact moment where the, where the thing converts from flexible to rigid, it's, it's the median of a large thermal window where it starts to, um, get get crystalline and rigid and then it's completely crystalline and rigid on the other end. So of course you would think, you know, if you get down to say 20 degrees, like it would in Boston or New York in the 19th century and you're walking around with rubber

“sold shoes, they're going to crystallize and break off. Right. That's what's going on and all”

has to do with the glass transition temperature. Okay. So during vocalization, they heat that up with sulfur and that makes those polymer chains link together with sulfur atoms. I guess that's like a, almost like a glue. Yeah. Like it's like a molecular glue from what I understand. Yeah. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. So so even when you apply intense heat, um, or extreme cold,

it will maintain its molecular shape. Yeah. But here's the thing I've been talking about,

why your elastic band doesn't last forever and why your socks will eventually be around your ankles.

I like oxidization. Natural rubber, this oxygen and in particular ozone is going to start breaking

“those bonds within just days. So it happens pretty quickly. And that's why we heat and treat rubber”

like we do. But even still, over time, that ozone and combine that with light UV radiation it's another culprit. That's what's going to cause that to eventually break down over time. That would make sense because with vocalization, what you're doing is adding sulfur to the polymer. Right. Yeah. And it would, it would make sense then that either UV radiation or something else could break those bonds between the sulfur and the other, the other ingredients. And then they

would be replaced by oxygen. So oxidation would take place. Right. Yeah. So it's pretty much ozone. UV radiation and then cold actually does make a difference. It's not going to hold up quite as well on cold weather. Like if you take, if you take a pair of underwear out and like, you know, negative 20 degrees in Minnesota and you start really stretching it out a lot,

“it's going to lose its elasticity really fast. Oh yeah. Is anybody from Minnesota can tell you that?”

Yeah. I mean, they may have to buy more underwear than like Hawaii. I have no idea. They all wear Union suits up there. Now let's try. So um, you want to finish with Pat Benatar? Man. Let's bring her out. Okay. Come on, Pat. It's going to do an acoustic set. That man, how great would that be? So um, we did a little digging and we were trying to figure out

who basically started the 80s Spandex Rocker trend. Yeah. Rocker's Bandex trend. She was the first

thing that came to my mind. Oh, really. Yeah. I just didn't know exactly how. I would have guessed it went back beyond Pat Benatar. And then I found out that Pat Benatar has been a musician for much longer than I realized. Right. But um, apparently the whole thing happens on Halloween of 1977. Awesome. And by the time Pat Benatar was already like a pretty regular fixture on the New York City Club circuit. And so she dressed up as a character from Cat Women of the Moon. Have you seen

that movie? Uh, no. I haven't either. But apparently Cat Women on the Moon is a cult classic sci-fi movie. Okay. And I guess they wear a lot of Spandex. So she dressed up in some

a Spandex get up and decided to play a show that night at Catcher Rising Star, which is basically

her house club. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. I haven't either. Is it still around? I don't know. Is it? I think I know of it from like comedy central in the 90s. Yeah. I think that was at the name of a show. But I think it was from that club. Oh. Was it from there? Yeah. I think so. No. Okay. It could be wrong. But anyway, she was used to playing shows there, but she played the show in this get-up. The Spandex get-up. And notice that the crowd was like into it a lot more than usual.

And then I said, wow. Wow. Wow. What's she wearing? Pretty much. It was about as simple as that. She, um, she was like, okay. Let me try this. I want to do a little experiment. And, um, I'm going to do this again, but not on Halloween. I'm going to dress up again and do the same show. And she didn't got another response. Like a way better than usual response. So she's like, that's it. I'm doing Spandex from now on. Wow. And that was that. 1977. Pat Benatar starts the

80s Spandex rocker trend. I would count that as the fourth dinner party factoid. Yeah. I would say so too. And if you want a fifth, uh, caturizing star is a chain of comedy clubs. And it was also a TV series in Canada. To now. You got anything else?

“Uh, no. Well, let's say for a last to get everybody. If you want to know more about it, type”

that word into the search bar. How stuff works that calm? And who knows what amazing things will come up. It's right. It's a search bar time for listener mate. Uh, yeah. I'm going to call this, um, short, but kind of funny. Uh, hey guys, quick and trivial email from a fan and Pittsburgh. Uh, I too appreciated, uh, in your, uh, Z episode on, uh, body snatching live episode on grave robbing. I too appreciated how cool Charlie Chaplin's body robbers partners name was.

Gancho Genev. And I tell you, we did that show a few times in UNI never ceased to not crack up

at the words Gancho Genev. It's true. It's still happening. Uh, being Jewish. I thought a little Hebrew Yiddish, uh, languages were involved. And Genev, in fact, does mean thief. Oh, really? And uh, then he stretches it a bit. Then he says Gancho for that matter seems to be Spanish for

stretch on the second part, but it seems as though Gancho Genev was born just the old Charlie Chaplin's

body. Wow. Uh, I'll give you props on the, uh, Genev part at least. And that is from B. D. Walberg,

“and he said PS. You might remember me from Pittsburgh at your live show. Uh, I asked a question in”

the Q&A about how you find new ways to rip on the post office. And I still remember I gave my trader Joe's bag to somebody in the audience. Mm-hmm. And that was B. D. He still has the still have a Chuck's trader Joe's bag hanging in my kitchen. Nice, man. Well, thanks a lot, B. D. We appreciate it. That was, uh, it would have been even more ironic, had he been referencing the D. B. Cooper episode. Oh, did you hear about the new info? I did, and it actually makes a lot of sense to me.

Yeah. So for anyone that hasn't seen, uh, they found some actual new science that, uh, seems to indicate they found these four elements in the tie that B. D. D. D. Cooper wore. And apparently these elements are very specific to work being done by the Boeing company. Yep. So it gives a lot of credence to the theory that he was a Boeing employee. And, and even more specifically, because it was on his tie, if he were like working the actual machines that were manufacturing this thing, he would have been

wearing like cover all there's something not a tie. So indicates that if he worked for Boeing, he would have been like an engineer or a manager who would have been wearing a tie on the floor while he was out there. Like, I, I think this was like the biggest lead they've ever had. I think so too.

“Pretty amazing. Yep. You know who's excited about it? Secret. Boy. If you want to know what we're”

talking about, we did a DB Cooper episode. And this popped it. That's right. It's a live episode that we hope will be, uh, available to you soon. Oh, what else? Oh, and actually, wow, boy, this is exciting. We just got literally an email reply from B. D. Hmm. Because I said, we were going to be reading this. And I think this bear's mentioning, uh, what a daymaker guys. If you use a pronoun for me, I go by they and them, or rather than heat or sheet. I know who talking about because I am

non by a non binary listener. What up? What up, B. D. Thank you. It's good to hear from you. And I'd love to surprise my BFF Carlisle with a great big audio high five. Well, I think that just happened. Wow. All right. This is like real-time correction slash back and forth with B. D. Let's just see what happened. Email Obama real quick. We'll sit here. Let's see what happens next. We're just going to take this for, for we're going to take this ride. All right. Well, thank you, B. D. Yeah, thanks a lot, B. D. Good

“to hear from you. All right. Well, if you want to get in touch with us, you can tweet to us. I'm at”

Josh underscore underscore clerk. Uh, you can also hit me up at the official S.Y. S. K. podcast handle. You can hang out with Chuck on Facebook at Charles W. Chuck Bryant and at stuff you should know.

Uh, you can send us both an email to [email protected]. And as always, join us at our

home on the web. Stuff you should know.com. For more on this, and thousands of other topics, visit HouseStuffWorks.com. Joy is essential, and it's also elusive. But now, there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101. It's a new podcast hosted by me, Hota Copy. If you're craving inspiration to maximize your joy, tune into these candid, uplifting,

and moving on air chats. Open your free iHeart Radio App Search, Joy 101, and listen now. Joy 101 with Hota Copy is presented by CVS June is Black Music Month, and on the drink champs podcast, we're speaking with the hottest names in the culture, like Swaley. Do you realize how legendary you are? I appreciate it. I've seen it, but I'm like, master, I like so much more to do, like Prince. He's got like 30 albums. We've got like fire right now, like that's the

rate we gotta be gone. Yeah, that's a good attitude. No matter the era, drink champs brings you the biggest names and the most unfiltered conversations. Listen to drink champs from the Black Effect podcast network on the iHeart Radio App. Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.

It just came out. Jamie, what did you just do? You just sit yourself up fairly. I've never heard

you tell this story. I've never told this story. This must have been tucked deep deep in the Jeremy Linfile. My name is MC Jin, excited to tell you about laugh, but not least. I'll be chatting with guests from all walks of life about the power of humor when it comes to facing difficult times. These will be conversations that remind us all life is hard, laugh harder. Listen,

This is an iHeart podcast. guaranteed human.