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Short Stuff: Safety Pins · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the Shorty. I'm Josh, and there's
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Chuck and there's Jerry. So let's get started. You must
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: be at least this tall to enjoy this podcast. Remember
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: the anxiety as a kid at amusement parks around that
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: I do you just wanted to be a little taller.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Now you look at it and you're like, wow, what
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: is that? Like? Is there are there? You know that's
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: there's kids that aren't that tall. It just seems so
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: short now. It was before it was like, oh man,
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: I hope I measure up. You'd like grow your hair out,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: ye to like make that extra like half inch or
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: something like that. Get your blow outcome, get your throw
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: up high. That's exactly right. Although remember my story is
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: that I was scared of roller coasters until my father
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: finally said, I'm not taking you back here and paying
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: this money until you get on a roller coaster, and
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: then you weren't scared. Well, no, I just went on
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: because I was like, I don't want to not come back.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: And then I loved it, of course, but he he
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: rolled the dice there, did you? Yeah? My dad took
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: me on Space Mountain when I was like five or something.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: Like that, and I hate roller coasters as a result. Yeah,
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: I'm not big on it. You same, basically the same
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: thing happened to you me. I don't remember how old
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: she was, but um it was Space Mountain her dad,
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: and um we uh we went back to Space Mountain
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  Speaker 1: like years ago to to conquer it, to conquer our fears,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: and we did. We did it. You got hammered it
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: in Tomorrowland and got a board. But that has nothing
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  Speaker 1: to do with safety pins. No, it doesn't. No safety pins.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Actually of a totally different, equally engrossing story, there was
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: a guy who's actually known as the inventor of the
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: safety pin, chiefly because he invented the safety pin. His
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: name is Walter Hunt, and there's a lot of different
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: interpretations of Walter Hunt. I think this house Stuff Works
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: article kind of misses the mark a little bit. So
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: he was one of America's great nineteenth century inventors. Number one,
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: um number two. He invented the safety pin. Which is
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: that just if he had just invented the safety pin,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: that would be something. But he invented the safety pin
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: back in eighteen forty nine. And if you look at
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: his safety pin invention and the safety pin that you
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: would go by today. It's virtually the same thing. Like
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: the guy right out of the gate invented a perfect
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: version of his invention. Yeah, and this is one of those.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: It's so brilliant and its simplicity. As I imagine, he
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: was just tinkering around with some wire, coiled it around
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: itself and said, hey, that acts as its own spring,
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: so it doesn't need to be two pieces, which is
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: sort of the genius of a safety pin. And then
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: the little clasp, the little safety class. That's why it's
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: called a safety pin keeps little fingers and big fingers,
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: I guess, and toes and toes from getting pricked and stuck.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: And uh, it was just a genius little idea. Yeah,
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: was so he The legend goes that he was fiddling
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: around with that wire and inadvertently invented the safety pin
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: while he was just kind of keeping his hands busy
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: trying to figure out how to pay off a fifteen
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: dollar debt. It could not find what the debt was for,
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: but it was to a pal Okay, so okay, we'll
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: go with that. But then when he figured out this
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: this safety pin was a pretty good idea, he went
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: and patented it. But then he sold the patent to
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: either that friend or somebody else to pay off the
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: fifteen dollar debt. But he sold it for like four
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: hundred bucks. Which did you do the calculation there? No?
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: What is that today? I didn't? Do? You want me
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: to just talk for a minute while while you type?
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: I do? Can you do a little tap dance? Yeah?
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: But the point is is that four dollars back then,
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: and we'll get the number in a sec was it
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: was a great deal of money, but obviously nothing compared
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: to the riches that would have Befallen Walter Hunt. Had
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: he held onto that patent, it would be known as
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: the Hunt pin today probably, and he would his his
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: great great grandkids would be billionaires. Still, I would imagine,
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: oh yeah, if he if he earned royalties from it,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: um and they had kept up the patent, heck, yes,
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: or the trademark or something. I'm not sure how they
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: would do it, but I do have a number, Chuck,
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: it's about twelve thousand dollars, which bad. It isn't bad,
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: but so here's the thing. So the guy sold off
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  Speaker 1: his patented idea. Sometimes he's reported as not even having
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: patented it. Just sold the idea, which is wrong. Um.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: But so he sold the patent for just twelve grand um.
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  Speaker 1: He's often very much characterized as like shortsighted. Um. Maybe
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: just maybe just like an absent minded inventor type or
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: something like that. Okay, maybe you can say that with
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: the safety pin. But he he also invented something pretty
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: huge to the sewing machine. And this is where it
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: gets kind of like a little cloudy to me. Should
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: we take a break? Yeah, let's all right, we'll clear
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: the clouds out and we'll be back right after this. Okay,
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: so the clouds are still over us, Chuck, we're about
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: to part them. Okay, I thought you were about to say,
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: we're gonna rain down some knowledge. Oh that's way better.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: We should. We should retake this part cloudy with a
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: chance of knowledge. So so Walter Hunt invented the sewing
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: machine actually back in you a good almost twenty years
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  Speaker 1: before he invented the safety pin, and it had like
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: a curved eye needle had to shuttle, just basically like
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: the Singer sewing machine would later be. He invented it
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  Speaker 1: decades before anybody else was making these sewing machines. And
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: so yet again he's criticized for selling this idea without
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: pending it or patenting it and not doing anything with it.
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: He the story I saw was that he did come
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: up with this idea, and his daughter pointed out that
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  Speaker 1: this machine would put a lot of um impoverished women
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: out of work, which worked a sewers, and he said,
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  Speaker 1: oh well, I'm not gonna do anything with this, and
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: chose not to patent it and abandoned the idea so
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: that it wouldn't even be out there for anybody else
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  Speaker 1: to pick up and and work with. Did he destroy
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: his machine? From what I saw, he didn't even make
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: this prototype. I didn't see that anywhere else but in
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: this article. Yeah, because in our our own article it
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: even specifically says his prototype was wooden, which would lead
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: me to believe that unless someone just you know, was willing,
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: nillly making things up, that's got to be true, right,
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: I don't know, but this is what I'm saying. Things
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: are clouded. We we parted them some and then they
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: came back, all right. But either way, the reason that
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: you look at sewing machines today and don't see the
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: word hunt on them is just another sort of chink
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: in his armor as a really brilliant guy who didn't
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: see the big picture economically or didn't want to put
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: poor women out of work? Right, did I just overlook that? Yes,
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  Speaker 1: so you're saying it was noble. That's that's how I'm
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: taking it. Well, I hope, so that would be a
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: great you know, I like that better than I didn't
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: think it was very good, right, exactly because it was
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: made of wood. If he did prototype it, I'll say, yes,
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: it was probably made of would. But the reason why
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: it's a Singer, uh, is because a man named Isaac
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: Singer came along. There were actually two dudes, two businessmen,
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: allies How Isaac Singer, and they were in a battle
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: with each other to control this patent in the eighteen fifties.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: So what I couldn't tell is if they legit invented
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: the saying or if they ripped off Hunt somehow. Yeah,
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: not they It would have been Elias How He was
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: the one who held the patent, and Isaac Singer was
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: just making machines based on the same designs ignoring How's
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: patent because for some reason, somehow he knew that um
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: that it was actually William Hunt who had invented the
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  Speaker 1: sewing machine decades before. So they went to court and
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  Speaker 1: Isaac Singer said, Hunt, come in here and demonstrate that
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  Speaker 1: you you did this, and you can get the patent,
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  Speaker 1: and then I'll ignore your patent too, And the judge
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  Speaker 1: actually ruled that he that, yes, William Hunt was indeed
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: the inventor of the sewing machine, but it was too
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: late to retroactively file a patent. I wonder if there's
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: enough here for a movie. They made one about the
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: guy who who created the intermittent setting on the windshie wipers,
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: and they made one what's her face Jennifer Lawrence was
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: in the movie about the inventor Lady, Oh yeah, Joey
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: man Ghana. Yeah, So maybe there's enough here. It would
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: like call it so what And at the end of
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: the trailer it's spelled out and you would hear the
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  Speaker 1: sewing machine and it would sew it out the title
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: I don't, I don't. Maybe maybe this should just be
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: a trailer. So what seems like a working title right that,
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: like some producer comes in and changes and gets paid
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: a billion dollars for it. Right then it would be
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: called the Isaac Singer Follies So the other thing about
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: Walter Hunt, he invented plenty of other stuff to a
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: foot pedal alarm to warn people the street car was coming,
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: uh for sure, an antipodean walking device. Yeah, and that
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: I had no idea what that was. But apparently it's
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: like the human fly, like suction cup shoes. It's pretty
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: amazing and today, well not today, but say back in
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: the seventies, if you hung out with punks, you probably
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: saw a lot of safety pins. And you can thank
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  Speaker 1: Walter Hunt for that little fashion accessory too. Yeah, what
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: was the deal they would It was just you would
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: put a bunch of safety pins. I was not cool
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  Speaker 1: enough to do that stuff. So so there's a dispute
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: over who came up with this. Supposedly Richard hell one
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: of the original punk rockers. He accessorized a lot, and
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: he accessorized with safety pins. So some people say, well
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  Speaker 1: as Richard Hellett came up with it, but apparently Johnny
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: Rotten from the Sex Pistols has disputed that and said
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: that it was actually out of necessity to keep the
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: rs on your trousers from falling off because they just
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: wore beat up clothes. Yeah, because they were gutter punks.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: Didn't people actually put safety pins through their face? Some
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: people did. Walter Hunt did not like that. His ghost
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: was very upset by this um, but no one could
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: see that. Wow. So from the safety pin to the
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: sewing machine too, said Vicious. Yeah, that's the logical order
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: of operation. Really, it's American inventors. Toda. Uh if you
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: want to you got anything else? No, I just know
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: that I want to go out and get some antibody
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: and choose. Now I do too. Man, you just climb
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: up a building and say thank you, William Hunt. Uh,
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: let's see. If you want to get in touch with us,
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: just go to our website, okay, stuff you should know
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: dot com. It's got all of our social media links
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: and you can also send us an email to Stuff
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: podcast how Stuff Works dot com