Latest / Stuff You Should Know / Etch A Sketch!
Transcript
- 0:01Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from how Stuff Works
- 0:04Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark.
- 0:14Speaker 1: There's Charles w. Chucky Bryant, and there's Jerry uh the
- 0:19Speaker 1: Delicious dish rolland and this is Stuff you should Know,
- 0:24Speaker 1: the vintage nostalgia addition that went off to China and
- 0:29Speaker 1: then got sold to a different company edition. So do
- 0:32Speaker 1: you want to have a rough list of classic toys
- 0:35Speaker 1: we've covered? You wanna hear it? Oh? Lay it on me.
- 0:38Speaker 1: I'm sure I've missed something, but it did help me
- 0:41Speaker 1: think of some more that we should do. It. Slinky,
- 0:45Speaker 1: we did slinky. Oh yeah, we did slink. Okay, yeah,
- 0:47Speaker 1: Lego Oh yeah, of course. Barbie sure, her boyfriend g
- 0:53Speaker 1: I Joe. Yeah, that was a good one. Sorry, wait
- 0:56Speaker 1: a minute, Wait a minute, I'm sorry. Did we just
- 0:59Speaker 1: specifically do a G I Joe winner in Action figures one?
- 1:03Speaker 1: I think both. We definitely did action figures, although probably not. Okay,
- 1:07Speaker 1: go ahead, I'll cross check that. Hot wheels, So so
- 1:10Speaker 1: this is a made up list, is what you're saying.
- 1:12Speaker 1: Hot wheels? Ye, I'm glad you didn't. You didn't call
- 1:15Speaker 1: it hot wheels. Easy bake oven m play dough, silly putty.
- 1:24Speaker 1: All right, do you count boomerangs? Yes, sure, do you
- 1:28Speaker 1: count Monopoly? Yeah, Yo yos. Of course, Hula Hoops. I
- 1:37Speaker 1: knew Hula Hoops was after Yo Yos. I just knew it.
- 1:40Speaker 1: Teddy Ruxpan, we we covered him in our Christmas show
- 1:42Speaker 1: this year. Oh yeah, that's a deep cut right there.
- 1:45Speaker 1: And then that's all I have. But um, I could
- 1:48Speaker 1: have sworn we did it on Frisbees, but I cannot
- 1:50Speaker 1: find it. Yeah. I feel like we did Frisbees too,
- 1:55Speaker 1: because I think we talked about like frall for something
- 1:57Speaker 1: at some point. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe it's out
- 2:00Speaker 1: there and I just didn't or maybe it's under a
- 2:02Speaker 1: flying disc or something. Oh that's possible. Yeah, we made
- 2:08Speaker 1: that joke about calling it a novelty flying disc because Frisbee,
- 2:11Speaker 1: like used to see everybody who called anything else to Frisbee.
- 2:14Speaker 1: Maybe I'll have to look, but that there's probably more
- 2:16Speaker 1: out there. But that's a solid you know, twelve or thirteen.
- 2:20Speaker 1: That's pretty good, which leads us to edge sketch. Yes,
- 2:24Speaker 1: one of the hundred top hundred toys of the century,
- 2:29Speaker 1: according to UM, I want to say not the toy
- 2:33Speaker 1: Hall of Fame. It's just in the Toy Hall of Fame.
- 2:38Speaker 1: Kid who makes lists online? All right, Uh, this is
- 2:42Speaker 1: the hundred best toys of the century. This is the
- 2:45Speaker 1: hundred best guitar solos of the seventies. Oh man, I'd
- 2:49Speaker 1: love to do a show on that. That would be
- 2:51Speaker 1: pretty cool. I can't remember who named that that who
- 2:54Speaker 1: made that list, but it's a high honor. It's a
- 2:56Speaker 1: high accolade, even if we can't remember who came up
- 2:59Speaker 1: with it. Like, it just catches the ubiquitous toy. Everybody
- 3:02Speaker 1: knows what an that just sketches unless you go to
- 3:04Speaker 1: France and then they'll say, oh, you mean like cro
- 3:07Speaker 1: magic and you you might say, like, well, why would
- 3:11Speaker 1: they have anything to say about the extra sketch in France?
- 3:13Speaker 1: Turns out, buddy, the a just sketch is actually French
- 3:18Speaker 1: in origin. Did you know that before this? I did not.
- 3:22Speaker 1: I didn't either, because it seems like super American, you know,
- 3:25Speaker 1: it looks like a TV and just feels like pure Americana.
- 3:30Speaker 1: So when I realized I had some French stank on it, uh,
- 3:35Speaker 1: my dreams were dashed. You like, it smells like champagne
- 3:38Speaker 1: and cheese. Which is kind of pleasant. No, I didn't
- 3:42Speaker 1: really care. I thought it was I thought it was great. Sketch,
- 3:44Speaker 1: erase and sketch again. The logline that will forever be
- 3:49Speaker 1: tied to this really interesting little toy. And um, I
- 3:54Speaker 1: can't remember who it is in this article, but they
- 3:56Speaker 1: were interviewing different folks. I think it was someone from
- 3:58Speaker 1: the company commented, and I totally agree that, like, it's
- 4:02Speaker 1: amazing that today, in in the digital world and Bluetooth
- 4:07Speaker 1: and WiFi and video gaming as it is, that this
- 4:11Speaker 1: little um low fi toy that doesn't even have batteries
- 4:15Speaker 1: in it, much less hook up to the internet is
- 4:19Speaker 1: still like super popular and still has a little bit
- 4:21Speaker 1: of mystique. And I agree with them, And I think
- 4:24Speaker 1: the reason why one of them is like you look
- 4:27Speaker 1: at it and you're still kind of like, how does
- 4:29Speaker 1: this thing work? Right, Well, we're going to ruin that
- 4:32Speaker 1: mystique for everybody because we're gonna explain how it works
- 4:35Speaker 1: actually in this episode. But hopefully it won't affect that
- 4:39Speaker 1: just sketch sales, because we love I just catch you know,
- 4:42Speaker 1: all right, should we go to France? We will go
- 4:44Speaker 1: to France sometime. It's apparently not clear whether it was
- 4:48Speaker 1: nineteen fifty five or nineteen fifty six, But in a
- 4:51Speaker 1: little town called Vitry Sir Sin, which means Victory on
- 4:55Speaker 1: the Sin River, there was a company called what was
- 5:01Speaker 1: the name of the company, chuck uh lynn crusta company name.
- 5:08Speaker 1: It is a terrible name. But the reason they called
- 5:10Speaker 1: themselves that is because Lynn Crusta is a type of
- 5:14Speaker 1: wall covering that was really popular in the nineteenth or
- 5:17Speaker 1: early twenty centuries. You know, like, have you ever been
- 5:20Speaker 1: into an old, creepy, abandoned house and like the walls
- 5:23Speaker 1: are covered in what looks like dimpled tin with like
- 5:26Speaker 1: some weird patterns to it or whatever. M m no,
- 5:30Speaker 1: but keep going, Okay, So where if you you could
- 5:35Speaker 1: rub your hand over it's very much it's like heavily embossed.
- 5:38Speaker 1: Sometimes it's painted and it's just imagined. That is like
- 5:42Speaker 1: Wayne scouting in the house. That is Lynn Crusta. And
- 5:46Speaker 1: so that is one of the two things that this
- 5:48Speaker 1: company made in the fifties, Lynn crusta wall coverings and
- 5:51Speaker 1: artificial leather that is really neither here nor there, but
- 5:55Speaker 1: I could I was with you. I was like, what
- 5:57Speaker 1: kind of a name is that for a company. I
- 5:59Speaker 1: looked it up. They just basically be like if you
- 6:02Speaker 1: and I called our podcast podcast, because that's what we did,
- 6:06Speaker 1: was make podcasts, crust pod Crusta, just the name crust Anyway.
- 6:13Speaker 1: I think I know what you're talking about because I have,
- 6:16Speaker 1: uh we have a pie safe that has that metal
- 6:20Speaker 1: tin stuff. But it's I've never seen it on a wall,
- 6:22Speaker 1: but I bet it's about the same thing, virtually the
- 6:25Speaker 1: same thing. Yeah, okay, so that's link Crusta and that's
- 6:28Speaker 1: where this guy worked. His name was Andre Cassagnas. Well,
- 6:36Speaker 1: if it's French, wouldn't it be uh Caissan is that pronounced? Yeah,
- 6:43Speaker 1: I think you just nailed it. Actually, Andre Cassong. Well
- 6:47Speaker 1: that's what we're gonna call him. And we have gone
- 6:49Speaker 1: back in time. You didn't know fifty five or fifty six,
- 6:52Speaker 1: I say we go to fifty four. Just play it safe,
- 6:55Speaker 1: setup shop in France and maybe get some emails done.
- 6:58Speaker 1: Alright for a couple of years. Why not we could
- 7:01Speaker 1: use a break um because you know, podcaster burnouts a
- 7:04Speaker 1: real thing. Really, we're dropping, We're dropping like flies, all right.
- 7:10Speaker 1: So he's working in this factory. It's north of Paris,
- 7:13Speaker 1: and they are making these uh wall coverings like you're
- 7:17Speaker 1: talking about. And he this is a little confusing how
- 7:21Speaker 1: this actually happens if you ask me, or at least
- 7:24Speaker 1: the way that the first article put it, it's confusing.
- 7:28Speaker 1: Oh you're leaving it to me. I noticed by your
- 7:31Speaker 1: by your pass after that, well, I mean no, let's
- 7:34Speaker 1: let's I'll start it. But I just still don't quite
- 7:37Speaker 1: get it. He marked up with pencil on a see
- 7:42Speaker 1: through decal, so like he was putting on an electrical plate,
- 7:46Speaker 1: um like a light switch. And on that plate, like
- 7:48Speaker 1: many things, has like a little see through plastic that
- 7:52Speaker 1: you peel off. Um, so he was writing on that
- 7:55Speaker 1: he peeled it off. But then that's where it loses me.
- 7:58Speaker 1: It's to exactly what took place. So okay, remember this
- 8:03Speaker 1: is link Crusta and they make metal wall coverings, which
- 8:06Speaker 1: means there's metal dust in the air, metal shavings everywhere, right,
- 8:12Speaker 1: all of them are. Um that's what's crazy. This guy
- 8:15Speaker 1: made it to that ripole age of eighty six after
- 8:17Speaker 1: breathing that for years. But um, so there's there's metal
- 8:21Speaker 1: dust everywhere, including on this electrical switch plate that he's installing.
- 8:26Speaker 1: And I guess the decal against the plate. And I
- 8:29Speaker 1: think what happened was when he marked on the decal
- 8:33Speaker 1: and pulled the decale off, he'd seen that he had
- 8:36Speaker 1: disturbed the metal shavings that were stuck to the underside
- 8:40Speaker 1: of the decal. Do you see what I mean? Like
- 8:44Speaker 1: he he had disturbed the shape, so so there was
- 8:47Speaker 1: like the whole decal is coated in a metal dust.
- 8:52Speaker 1: He marks on it with a pencil and the impression
- 8:55Speaker 1: that he makes like gouges out lines on the backside
- 9:01Speaker 1: the decal. But I know it's really tough. It was magic. Basically,
- 9:05Speaker 1: this man witnessed a feat of magic that still cannot
- 9:09Speaker 1: be explained to this day. And that's where he got
- 9:12Speaker 1: his idea for the etch just sketch amazing. So a big,
- 9:17Speaker 1: big moment he has that that literal lightbulb that goes
- 9:21Speaker 1: off of his or I'm not literal of course, light
- 9:24Speaker 1: bulb above his head, although you never know, there may
- 9:27Speaker 1: have been a light bulb in that factory right above
- 9:29Speaker 1: his head. Why not? Uh? And he said, all right,
- 9:32Speaker 1: this is uh, this, this can be something. He however,
- 9:36Speaker 1: did not have a lot of money to sink into
- 9:40Speaker 1: this weird idea, and so he had to partner with
- 9:44Speaker 1: somebody with money, man named Paul uh Chase c j
- 9:49Speaker 1: z E or maybe Shaw's if he's French. And this
- 9:53Speaker 1: guy had some dough because he owned a plastic injection
- 9:55Speaker 1: molding company. This is like early on, I wonder if
- 9:59Speaker 1: we could count. That's a toy, the the little plastic
- 10:04Speaker 1: machines that spent out little plastic guitars in Chicago and
- 10:07Speaker 1: it zoos. Yes, Rama, that would definitely count. Yeah, that
- 10:12Speaker 1: goes on the list. Yeah, so he didn't. It wasn't
- 10:14Speaker 1: mold rama, but it was plastic injection molding that this
- 10:17Speaker 1: guy made his money from. Uh. And this where things
- 10:20Speaker 1: get a little confusing historically because, uh, the man who
- 10:25Speaker 1: his accountant, his name was Arthur Grangenny. You are nailing
- 10:30Speaker 1: the French today. Try to run French people, You can't.
- 10:33Speaker 1: Chuck is pronouncing your words just beautifully. So his accountant
- 10:38Speaker 1: is actually given credit a lot of times because he
- 10:41Speaker 1: filed the patent under his name, which I'm curious about
- 10:47Speaker 1: how that works legally. Uh. He so he was do
- 10:51Speaker 1: you remember the first time we did south By Southwest
- 10:55Speaker 1: and on the sign it had like somebody I can't
- 10:59Speaker 1: remember whose name it was, but whoever had like filed
- 11:02Speaker 1: the application to get us into south By Southwest. It
- 11:05Speaker 1: said that like, that's who was performing in the room
- 11:07Speaker 1: that day. I think this is the same, basically the
- 11:12Speaker 1: same thing. Where as like the US government bureaucracy, the
- 11:16Speaker 1: Patent and UM Trademark office basically said, whoever his name
- 11:20Speaker 1: is on there, that is, who is the patent holder.
- 11:23Speaker 1: And since um Grand Gene, who was the accountant of Chaise,
- 11:27Speaker 1: who was the partner of qusayan Um, since he was
- 11:33Speaker 1: the one who actually filled out the application and paid
- 11:37Speaker 1: for the application for the patent, as far as the
- 11:39Speaker 1: government was concerned, he was the person who patented the
- 11:43Speaker 1: just catch in the United States, even though grand made
- 11:46Speaker 1: no claim on it whatsoever, immediately transferred the title over
- 11:49Speaker 1: to Shase. He's for for decades, everybody thought Arthur grand
- 11:54Speaker 1: Jean was the guy who invented the A sketch. Interesting, alright,
- 11:58Speaker 1: so that was July nine fifty nine was when this
- 12:01Speaker 1: patent was granted. And um, I guess we should just
- 12:05Speaker 1: look at the little guy itself, the little TV, looking
- 12:09Speaker 1: that iconic red frame with the two dials which it
- 12:13Speaker 1: didn't have initially. Well we'll get to that. But um,
- 12:15Speaker 1: the underside of the screen here has what's known in
- 12:19Speaker 1: the patent as a pull virulent material such as aluminum powder.
- 12:24Speaker 1: Is that French as well? I don't know, uh? And
- 12:28Speaker 1: then to keep that from clumping up there a little
- 12:29Speaker 1: tiny plastic beads and then the two knobs control um
- 12:34Speaker 1: again from the patent, a movable tracing stylus, although initially
- 12:39Speaker 1: it was a joystick, isn't that right? Yeah, yeah, basically
- 12:42Speaker 1: like an atari um, but it served the same purpose
- 12:46Speaker 1: and it was it was um held together the same
- 12:49Speaker 1: way through an intricate system of pulleys and gears that
- 12:53Speaker 1: that moved the stylus either upward or downward. And then
- 12:57Speaker 1: if you combine the upward and downward together you could
- 12:59Speaker 1: make the diagonals and circles and stuff like that. But
- 13:02Speaker 1: it's if you it's really tough to describe what's going
- 13:06Speaker 1: on and and and that's just sketch. But there's an
- 13:08Speaker 1: House Stuff Works article from years back called Inside and
- 13:11Speaker 1: that just sketch where the people the House of Verse
- 13:13Speaker 1: like took one apart and photographed it and explained it
- 13:16Speaker 1: step by step, and it really becomes much simpler and
- 13:19Speaker 1: ruins any bit of magic. There is to it when
- 13:22Speaker 1: you see inside ants just sketch, but it's still kind
- 13:24Speaker 1: of wondrous, you know, like the engineer and you was like, wow,
- 13:27Speaker 1: that's pretty cool. Yeah, it's sort of like, Um, I mean,
- 13:29Speaker 1: it's not a negative image, I don't think. But what's
- 13:32Speaker 1: going on when you're moving those knobs, Uh, there's a
- 13:36Speaker 1: stylist that's actually removing like the screen is coated with
- 13:40Speaker 1: this powder. So it's actually removing powder, not adding something
- 13:44Speaker 1: to the screen. Yes, exactly. And of course if you
- 13:47Speaker 1: want to get that away and start a new picture,
- 13:52Speaker 1: you just shake that thing up and that recoads the
- 13:54Speaker 1: screen once again with that powder. Yeah. So like you
- 13:58Speaker 1: know how your TV screen always has tons of dust
- 14:01Speaker 1: on it, no matter how often you dust it. Sure,
- 14:04Speaker 1: So that's because like that dust is attracted electrostatically through
- 14:08Speaker 1: an electrical charge to the glass. That's they take advantage
- 14:12Speaker 1: of that same thing with the underside of the um
- 14:16Speaker 1: etch a sketch and that aluminum dust which sticks to everything,
- 14:19Speaker 1: like it wants to stick to the glass because I
- 14:21Speaker 1: think it's missing some electrons or something. And then when
- 14:23Speaker 1: you move the stylus through it, you're just removing that
- 14:26Speaker 1: that dust. Like you said, it's not a negative. It's
- 14:28Speaker 1: the removal of dust. And that's the next that just
- 14:31Speaker 1: sketch like at its at its core. And what's interesting,
- 14:34Speaker 1: Chuck is like, that is how a nuts just sketch
- 14:37Speaker 1: today works. That's how ants just sketch worked in nineteen
- 14:40Speaker 1: sixty two, like the two meaning like also but that
- 14:45Speaker 1: that that dude, Andre Cassaigne said, this is how this
- 14:49Speaker 1: is gonna work. And it's it's basically the same thing.
- 14:52Speaker 1: That's pretty awesome. Uh, let's take a break. Yes, we're
- 14:55Speaker 1: gonna come back and talk about coming stateside right after this. Alright, So, Chuck,
- 15:18Speaker 1: so how did we agree on his last name? I
- 15:21Speaker 1: think I'm butchering it still. And I even took years
- 15:24Speaker 1: of French in high school. I think he said casserole.
- 15:28Speaker 1: All right, Andre Casserole. That seems it seems wrong. Yeah,
- 15:33Speaker 1: I'm I'm still gonna go with Cassan. Okay, there you go.
- 15:39Speaker 1: Andre Cassan. Um, he knew he was onto something like
- 15:43Speaker 1: this guy was an electrician. He was like, this is
- 15:45Speaker 1: a great idea, this is a prototype I made, This
- 15:48Speaker 1: is this is worth something? So he um and Cruise,
- 15:52Speaker 1: I guess funded a trip to the Nuremberg Toy Fair
- 15:57Speaker 1: UM in ninety nine. And uh, it was there that
- 16:02Speaker 1: Cassan was walking around saying, check this thing out. It
- 16:06Speaker 1: is yours for a mere hundred thousand dollars, which at
- 16:10Speaker 1: the time was a lot of money. I think it
- 16:14Speaker 1: was eight hundred and seventy thou dollars today. And that's
- 16:17Speaker 1: what this guy wanted for the for the right to
- 16:19Speaker 1: produce this um. And every toymaker at the place said no,
- 16:24Speaker 1: including a little toymaker called ohio Art Um. Everybody turned
- 16:29Speaker 1: it down, and Cassan went home from the toy fair
- 16:31Speaker 1: empty handed. But he he didn't give up. He still persisted.
- 16:35Speaker 1: But that was a big strikeout for him right out
- 16:38Speaker 1: of the gate. Yes, so Ohio Art eventually settles on
- 16:42Speaker 1: a number of grand for the rights to make this
- 16:45Speaker 1: thing in the United States. Uh. It is still called
- 16:49Speaker 1: La Chrome Magique in France because they had a different
- 16:54Speaker 1: licensing deal over there. From the from the get go
- 16:57Speaker 1: Um and Ohio Art company is pretty interesting. It started,
- 17:00Speaker 1: did you see that thing? Should? Yeah? They started out
- 17:04Speaker 1: in nineteen o eight, founded by a man named a
- 17:07Speaker 1: dentist named Dr Henry S. WinCE Winsler in Archibald Ohio.
- 17:13Speaker 1: He gets out of dentistry because he's like, hey, man,
- 17:17Speaker 1: toys is the future. Toys is There's no future in teeth.
- 17:23Speaker 1: In a decade, no one in America is gonna have teeth.
- 17:25Speaker 1: It's just a losing trade to be in his dentistry. Yeah,
- 17:29Speaker 1: so he uh all the way forward. He rented a
- 17:33Speaker 1: UM musical, hired fifteen women and they were making metal
- 17:38Speaker 1: picture frames at first, to great great success. M hmm yeah. Um.
- 17:44Speaker 1: So they they use something called the metal lithography, which
- 17:48Speaker 1: is a type of printing, and I think the metal
- 17:52Speaker 1: refers to like the medium that you're using to print with,
- 17:56Speaker 1: like the like you carve a picture out of metal
- 17:59Speaker 1: and you put inc it and then you print on
- 18:01Speaker 1: whatever you want. But they were printing on to metal.
- 18:04Speaker 1: Like they had like these UM picture frames and pictures
- 18:07Speaker 1: that were like a huge seller of a Cupid. It
- 18:10Speaker 1: was a pair of like oval plates basically, but they
- 18:13Speaker 1: were metal printed printed pictures on them, like a Cupid
- 18:16Speaker 1: hanging out and then the same Cupid sleeping, and it's
- 18:20Speaker 1: just kind of like whatever, Like these days, it seems
- 18:23Speaker 1: kind of it's got a tinge of old timey creepiness.
- 18:25Speaker 1: But in the first half of the twentieth century, there
- 18:29Speaker 1: were fifty million sets of those things sold in the
- 18:32Speaker 1: United States, which is an astounding amount. It's basically every
- 18:36Speaker 1: house in America had a pair of this, and that
- 18:38Speaker 1: really kind of made Ohio art like a very viable business.
- 18:43Speaker 1: But they eventually got into things like sand pails and
- 18:46Speaker 1: little trucks and that kind of thing. Anything that was
- 18:49Speaker 1: printed with metal before the time that plastic toys came along,
- 18:52Speaker 1: they were into so it wasn't a huge leap into
- 18:54Speaker 1: the edge just sketch, but the edge sketch was definitely
- 18:56Speaker 1: different than anything that they'd ever kind of messed around
- 18:59Speaker 1: with for Did you know I've done metal lithography? No? Yeah,
- 19:06Speaker 1: it was one of our in industrial arts. It was,
- 19:09Speaker 1: you know, and at least at my school, each quarter
- 19:11Speaker 1: you did a different medium or whatever, and uh, lithography
- 19:16Speaker 1: was something we did one quarter. Do you remember what
- 19:19Speaker 1: you printed? I'm trying to remember what I printed. It's
- 19:24Speaker 1: funny I can remember that because we also at one
- 19:26Speaker 1: quarter was screen printing. Remember the T shirts? I did
- 19:30Speaker 1: monkeys T shirts like this, see no evil here, No
- 19:34Speaker 1: evil monkeys. No, the Band of Monkeys. They're there their
- 19:39Speaker 1: logo with the guitar spelled out as monkeys, Like, wow,
- 19:43Speaker 1: did you draw it yourself? No? No, no, of course
- 19:46Speaker 1: not um, but we did metal sheet lithography. I don't
- 19:50Speaker 1: remember all of the process, but what I do remember
- 19:54Speaker 1: was essentially was like burning chemically burning images onto metal
- 20:01Speaker 1: plates and then that metal plate was used to print. Okay,
- 20:07Speaker 1: So so the metal and metal lithography does it talks
- 20:11Speaker 1: about the metal press that you're using to print with
- 20:15Speaker 1: like at the end of There may be different processes,
- 20:18Speaker 1: but in my class, we would um do this thing
- 20:21Speaker 1: and apply this like uh image with like this gel
- 20:25Speaker 1: onto a metal sheet and use this combination of chemicals
- 20:28Speaker 1: that would burn that into like make it part of
- 20:31Speaker 1: the metal. And then all of a sudden you would
- 20:33Speaker 1: have a metal sheet within thing on it like a
- 20:35Speaker 1: negative image, and then you would use that in the
- 20:38Speaker 1: printing process to print a positive image, right, and you
- 20:42Speaker 1: could print use that to print onto anything including other metal. Right.
- 20:46Speaker 1: Well hey man, that's where my knowledge and again this
- 20:48Speaker 1: was ninth grade me, so I've I've forgotten a lot
- 20:50Speaker 1: of things over that time period, right, And I'm sure
- 20:54Speaker 1: I just butchered that. But that's my one little dance
- 20:57Speaker 1: with metal lithography. Well, I'll tell you who would be
- 20:59Speaker 1: able to tell us exactly how you could, um, how
- 21:02Speaker 1: metal lithography works. It's anybody who works at Ohio Art,
- 21:05Speaker 1: because not only was that their bread and butter before
- 21:08Speaker 1: the atch just catch it still is today. Actually so
- 21:12Speaker 1: so Ohio Art, like I guess, gets in touch with
- 21:15Speaker 1: um Andre Cassan and and either he got in touch
- 21:19Speaker 1: with them again or they got in touch with him.
- 21:21Speaker 1: I think it was the ladder of the two and said, hey,
- 21:24Speaker 1: we heard you're selling this for a hundred grand. It's
- 21:26Speaker 1: way too rich for our blood. How about either fifteen
- 21:29Speaker 1: thousand or twenty five thousand, depending on who you ask
- 21:32Speaker 1: in the future. And Cassan is like, what are you
- 21:34Speaker 1: talking about there, Like, just take the money. And so
- 21:37Speaker 1: they either got it for fifteen thousand or twenty five thousand,
- 21:40Speaker 1: which is still substantial. I mean it was like around
- 21:42Speaker 1: a hundred k or um two k something like that,
- 21:46Speaker 1: depending on which one it was, and Cassan was quite
- 21:50Speaker 1: a happy man. There was a story where Um, the
- 21:53Speaker 1: guy who was running the show at Ohio Art and
- 21:55Speaker 1: his wife went over to meet Andre Cassan and just
- 21:58Speaker 1: kind of have like an initial eating and like shake
- 22:00Speaker 1: his hand and all that and buy the license from him,
- 22:04Speaker 1: and Cassan was like welcome and had like this huge
- 22:06Speaker 1: spread of baguettes and champagne and everything at his house,
- 22:09Speaker 1: which is pretty cute because there was just like this
- 22:11Speaker 1: humble guy who came up with a really great idea
- 22:14Speaker 1: for a toy and was finally like selling it for
- 22:17Speaker 1: a lot of cash. Interesting, what the baggetts in champagne? Yeah,
- 22:25Speaker 1: but you know what are you gonna do? Well? Went
- 22:27Speaker 1: in France, right, so he is. Once he's on board
- 22:31Speaker 1: with Ohio Art, he gets together with their chief engineer,
- 22:35Speaker 1: Jerry Burger and says, and Burger's like, listen here, frenchie,
- 22:40Speaker 1: you need to drop the joystick. It's all knobs these days.
- 22:43Speaker 1: And he said, what does that knob? And he was like, well,
- 22:47Speaker 1: let me show you, and he he introduced the idea
- 22:51Speaker 1: of UM, the same system like you were talking about,
- 22:53Speaker 1: but knobs instead of a joystick to move that little
- 22:57Speaker 1: line horizontal or vertical, or as you pointed out, if
- 23:01Speaker 1: you're really talented and you can master both at once,
- 23:04Speaker 1: you can actually do UM rooted. Well, if you're really good,
- 23:07Speaker 1: you can do very nice current lines. But beyond rudimentary.
- 23:12Speaker 1: No neither am I I can make a line go
- 23:15Speaker 1: up and a line go to the left or right. Yeah,
- 23:17Speaker 1: well we'll get you can't even make it go down.
- 23:20Speaker 1: We'll get to the art of it. Um maybe at
- 23:23Speaker 1: the end. But because there are some serious artists out
- 23:26Speaker 1: there doing some cool stuff, but at any rate, at
- 23:29Speaker 1: just sketch. It was rebranded as etch a sketch in
- 23:32Speaker 1: the United States, Ohio Arts producing them for the nineteen
- 23:36Speaker 1: six holiday season and they sold about six hundred thousand
- 23:40Speaker 1: of these um that year, which is a it's a lot, yeah,
- 23:46Speaker 1: and they sold it for a lot of money too.
- 23:47Speaker 1: They they went for sale at two dollars and nine
- 23:51Speaker 1: cents apiece, which is sixty four in today's money. Um.
- 23:57Speaker 1: But I mean if you go by and it's just
- 23:58Speaker 1: sketched today, it's between and in fifteen bucks. So that
- 24:01Speaker 1: was a lot of money, especially to sell six hundred
- 24:03Speaker 1: thousand of these things, especially if you were selling like
- 24:06Speaker 1: creepy you know, metal waste baskets with an unsettling clown
- 24:11Speaker 1: painted on it are printed on it like right before this.
- 24:14Speaker 1: This is a huge it was. It was a good
- 24:16Speaker 1: move by the people at Ohio Art to buy the
- 24:19Speaker 1: license of this thing, in other words, and they say,
- 24:21Speaker 1: chook that it coincided really perfectly with television, so much
- 24:26Speaker 1: so that that they believe like that is one of
- 24:28Speaker 1: the reasons why Jerry Burger was like, you need knobs,
- 24:31Speaker 1: this thing needs to look like a TV set, because
- 24:33Speaker 1: that's what's all the rage with the kids right now. Yeah,
- 24:36Speaker 1: and he um. It was one of the first toys
- 24:40Speaker 1: to actually do a TV commercial. And so if it's
- 24:43Speaker 1: NIX and you're a child watching, first of all, your
- 24:48Speaker 1: mind is blown because you're watching in television to begin with.
- 24:52Speaker 1: It's just like you, I can't believe this. I can't
- 24:54Speaker 1: believe what's going on right now. Then a TV commercial
- 24:57Speaker 1: comes on for a toy uh uh, and this toy
- 25:01Speaker 1: has animation in it to where like they would at
- 25:04Speaker 1: just sketch a little rocket ship and then that rocket
- 25:06Speaker 1: ship that rocket ship would animate and take off. And
- 25:09Speaker 1: this was like these kids might have I mean, keep
- 25:12Speaker 1: in mind, kids in nineteen sixty were idiots, but they
- 25:15Speaker 1: might as well have been dosed with lsd mm hmm.
- 25:18Speaker 1: You know, they just kept fainting over and over again
- 25:22Speaker 1: throughout the commercial because they could not believe what they
- 25:24Speaker 1: were seeing. And it's just it's just an etch, just sketch,
- 25:27Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, but it's genius. I love it. It is,
- 25:34Speaker 1: but it really I think the point was though that
- 25:38Speaker 1: like taking advantage of the novelty of TV and also
- 25:43Speaker 1: now having away like if you we just tried to
- 25:46Speaker 1: explain and that just sketch over a podcast prior to TV,
- 25:50Speaker 1: if that just sketch you come out during like the
- 25:51Speaker 1: Little Orphan, any radio era, they would have had to
- 25:55Speaker 1: have done the same thing. It wouldn't have landed quite
- 25:57Speaker 1: as well. The fact that a kid could see this
- 26:00Speaker 1: happening on their TV screen, it was pretty awesome. And
- 26:03Speaker 1: then also to say and then you just shake it,
- 26:05Speaker 1: turn it upside down and shake it and code the
- 26:08Speaker 1: glass screen again and you're you're drawing is gone forever.
- 26:12Speaker 1: Like to be able to see that TV made the
- 26:15Speaker 1: it just gets what it was like. For sure. It
- 26:18Speaker 1: definitely ushered into a position where it could become like
- 26:22Speaker 1: a cultural icon of a nostalgia. Yeah, I mean, you know,
- 26:27Speaker 1: they perfected it by the time they started rolling off
- 26:29Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty. Prior to that, like any product like this,
- 26:32Speaker 1: there was a lot of R and d um. One
- 26:34Speaker 1: of the people who worked there, talked about the mountain
- 26:36Speaker 1: of red frames behind the factory while they were trying
- 26:39Speaker 1: to get it right. Um, and it was such a
- 26:41Speaker 1: huge smash it out of the gate that uh As
- 26:44Speaker 1: legend has it they were manufacturing up until noon on
- 26:48Speaker 1: Christmas Eve just to get them to the West Coast
- 26:51Speaker 1: in time for Christmas morning. Yeah, that's pretty that's pretty cool.
- 26:56Speaker 1: I mean, they really wanted those kids to have those
- 26:58Speaker 1: Thats Just catches. They really wanted that money. Should we
- 27:02Speaker 1: take another break, Yeah, all right, we'll talk about some
- 27:05Speaker 1: some ways at Just Sketches ebbed and flowed and popularity
- 27:08Speaker 1: in pop culture over the years. Right for this, Chuck,
- 27:29Speaker 1: I don't know if we said it or not, but
- 27:31Speaker 1: from what I've seen, more than a hundred and seventy
- 27:34Speaker 1: five million ET Just sketches have been sold since nineteen six.
- 27:41Speaker 1: And we should point out we're not just like ticking
- 27:42Speaker 1: off a list of pop culture references. Like every time
- 27:45Speaker 1: this happened, uh ET Just Sketch sales would go up. Yeah,
- 27:50Speaker 1: like the Romney one increased sales like thirty percent. I
- 27:54Speaker 1: guess everybody was like, Oh, I just guess I forgot
- 27:56Speaker 1: about that. I think I'll go buy one right now. Well,
- 27:59Speaker 1: they actually branded after that, UM, Republican and Democrat sketches,
- 28:04Speaker 1: that didn't they Yeah, so you could buy a red
- 28:06Speaker 1: one or a blue one, but both of them came
- 28:08Speaker 1: with a sticker which I'm I'm assuming that they printed
- 28:11Speaker 1: on their metal lithography presses of a donkey and an elephant,
- 28:15Speaker 1: like playing Tugo war on the front of the White
- 28:17Speaker 1: House lawn. Yeah, that's just crazy, it is, but it's
- 28:20Speaker 1: also that's smart. You know, that's how you that's how
- 28:23Speaker 1: you make the money. UM. And then of course in
- 28:27Speaker 1: the movie Toy Story from Pixar, uh, that was UM
- 28:30Speaker 1: Like one of the character's name was and had the
- 28:33Speaker 1: fastest knobs in the West, and that was that was
- 28:37Speaker 1: always a very fun uh character. I think to see
- 28:39Speaker 1: them drawing things out really fast to communicate. Yeah, and
- 28:42Speaker 1: you know, you said something earlier, you were you were
- 28:44Speaker 1: talking about how like despite the fact that it doesn't
- 28:47Speaker 1: even have batteries, it's had the staying power for you know,
- 28:51Speaker 1: fifty something years, almost sixty years it's been around, UM
- 28:56Speaker 1: and it's a really simple thing that that the design
- 28:58Speaker 1: hasn't changed. And I think even more of a testimony
- 29:01Speaker 1: to you know, the the staying power of the etch
- 29:05Speaker 1: A Sketch is the fact that they have tried stuff
- 29:07Speaker 1: with batteries and like like things that connect to your
- 29:11Speaker 1: computer over the years, and nothing has managed to improve
- 29:14Speaker 1: on the original etch A sketch. Like there was do
- 29:18Speaker 1: you remember that at Just Sketch Animator? So I I
- 29:23Speaker 1: couldn't quite place it either, but I went and watched
- 29:25Speaker 1: an old ad. It was big in the eighties and
- 29:27Speaker 1: it was basically like an et just sketch, but there
- 29:30Speaker 1: was nothing mechanical about it. It was digital. You're creating
- 29:34Speaker 1: like a bit map digital picture and um. Then you'd
- 29:38Speaker 1: press like I guess play or something like that, and
- 29:40Speaker 1: it would just kind of run it um like a
- 29:43Speaker 1: flipbook over and over again. So your it just skets
- 29:46Speaker 1: drawing like came to life. But kids were like, no,
- 29:49Speaker 1: I'd rather have the original ETU sketch because that Sketch
- 29:52Speaker 1: Animator went away and the I just sketches still available today. Yeah,
- 29:57Speaker 1: I mean there have been um other variations. They had
- 29:59Speaker 1: the doodle sketch, Um, the plug in play, which this
- 30:05Speaker 1: sounds like a bad IDEA plug in play allows you
- 30:07Speaker 1: to draw on the TV screen. That's just asking for
- 30:10Speaker 1: trouble as a parent. UM and then the mobile app,
- 30:15Speaker 1: which I've been playing with today. Oh, how's it going? Well?
- 30:18Speaker 1: I mean, what do you think of this picture? Oh?
- 30:20Speaker 1: That's it's not bad. It looks kind of edges sketchy,
- 30:23Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, So what you can do is it's
- 30:25Speaker 1: kind of fun. UM. You can you can upload or
- 30:28Speaker 1: take a photo UM on your smartphone, plug it into
- 30:31Speaker 1: the app, and then it will instantly etchify it. And
- 30:35Speaker 1: what I've learned is that it's UM the more basic,
- 30:39Speaker 1: like a picture of your face, works much better than
- 30:42Speaker 1: something with a lot of stuff in the background. But
- 30:45Speaker 1: it's fun, right, yeah, you know, yeah, I like it.
- 30:48Speaker 1: I was reading reviews of the app. I didn't try
- 30:51Speaker 1: it myself like you, but it's uh it did say
- 30:55Speaker 1: like if it's a basic picture, you'll look way more
- 30:57Speaker 1: etch just sketchy. Yeah. So my official review is not bad.
- 31:00Speaker 1: So three stars out of six. Sure. I mean for
- 31:04Speaker 1: something that downloaded in thirty seconds and was free, I'm
- 31:07Speaker 1: gonna give it a half of them up, you know.
- 31:10Speaker 1: So UM one of the things that that has kind
- 31:14Speaker 1: of kept at just sketch alive for like the younger kids.
- 31:18Speaker 1: If I read this article about UM that's just sketch,
- 31:22Speaker 1: and it was right before they sold, so a lot
- 31:24Speaker 1: of people don't know ohio Art doesn't make that just
- 31:26Speaker 1: sketch anymore. They sold it to a brand called spin Master,
- 31:30Speaker 1: and I didn't I didn't see that. Yeah it's not
- 31:32Speaker 1: it's not ohio Art. Ohio Are it said we're going
- 31:34Speaker 1: back to metal lithography, and that's what they did. So
- 31:37Speaker 1: they sold that just sketch off to spin Master. Spin
- 31:40Speaker 1: Masters like, that's fine with us, baby, thanks for all
- 31:42Speaker 1: these licenses. Um, I mean I just sketch a frozen
- 31:46Speaker 1: branded that just sketches it. You might as well just
- 31:49Speaker 1: be like a printing press for money, right, So it
- 31:52Speaker 1: was probably a pretty goodbye for spin Master in Ohio Ar.
- 31:55Speaker 1: It was like this thing is it was great. It
- 31:57Speaker 1: was a good run while it lasted, but they all
- 32:00Speaker 1: so I had to oversee it through some really dark
- 32:02Speaker 1: times because, um, well, for one thing, like I just sketched,
- 32:08Speaker 1: is it landing with the millennials? I get the impression
- 32:11Speaker 1: like it used to um with the baby boomers. That
- 32:15Speaker 1: was one thing. Um. And Ohio Art also almost went
- 32:18Speaker 1: bankrupt because of it back in like two thousand one.
- 32:21Speaker 1: They managed to get some more money back into the
- 32:23Speaker 1: business and and stay afloat. But part of that also
- 32:26Speaker 1: was they had to send the manufacturing of that just
- 32:29Speaker 1: sketched off to China, which they were really unhappy about
- 32:32Speaker 1: because they lost like thirty five jobs in tiny little Brian, Ohio.
- 32:36Speaker 1: But eventually, like fifteen years later, they said, you know
- 32:39Speaker 1: what we're getting out that that's just sketch business and
- 32:41Speaker 1: sold it off to spin Master, which is a weird name.
- 32:45Speaker 1: But the but then one of the things, it's a
- 32:47Speaker 1: little weird, Ohio art's a little weird too. You don't
- 32:50Speaker 1: associate Ohio with art, you know, you just don't. I'll
- 32:55Speaker 1: say it again to Chrissy Hind. Chrissy Hind gets what
- 32:59Speaker 1: I'm saying for sure. Um So the thing that one
- 33:03Speaker 1: of the things that that is keeping it just sketch relevant.
- 33:05Speaker 1: The reason why, like if you walk up to like
- 33:07Speaker 1: a seventeen year old and say what do you think
- 33:09Speaker 1: about that? Just catch you say, oh, yeah, I've heard
- 33:11Speaker 1: of that. Because every once in a while you'll see
- 33:14Speaker 1: on the internets a photo or two of somebody who
- 33:19Speaker 1: is really really good at that just sketch and it
- 33:22Speaker 1: just kind of makes the rounds on social media. Yeah,
- 33:25Speaker 1: I mean everything from like the Mona Lisa to just
- 33:28Speaker 1: like portraits of people to landscapes. Uh. What's really fun
- 33:32Speaker 1: is you can go on YouTube and look at time
- 33:33Speaker 1: laps um renderings at just sketch renderings, which when you're
- 33:37Speaker 1: seeing it done super fast like that, you kind of
- 33:41Speaker 1: think like, I feel like I could do that, But
- 33:44Speaker 1: you really have to be a a master with those knobs.
- 33:47Speaker 1: Like UM, what I found is the thing you really
- 33:50Speaker 1: need to master to do everything um that you want
- 33:53Speaker 1: to do is being able to retrace well because as
- 33:57Speaker 1: everyone knows, it's not like a pencil can't pick it
- 34:00Speaker 1: up off the paper and start somewhere else. You have
- 34:03Speaker 1: to if you want to go somewhere else, you have
- 34:05Speaker 1: to retrace as closely to that original line as you can,
- 34:08Speaker 1: all the way back to that point that you want
- 34:10Speaker 1: to be at, or else it's just gonna look like
- 34:12Speaker 1: something you're that I did, which looks like something at
- 34:16Speaker 1: Toddler did. Yeah, And I mean like that's a it's
- 34:18Speaker 1: a really good point. When you're making a good at
- 34:20Speaker 1: just sketch drawing, it is all one single line, so
- 34:24Speaker 1: frequently double back over and that's just sketch. Artists will
- 34:27Speaker 1: use like that frame. They'll create a line frame around
- 34:30Speaker 1: the edges that they can travel back out to and
- 34:32Speaker 1: move around the picture like that. Pretty brilliant. Yeah, there's
- 34:35Speaker 1: a guy named m. George Vlosits the third who's known
- 34:39Speaker 1: for some pretty amazing portraits of Muhammad Ali, Barack Obama,
- 34:43Speaker 1: Lebron James. There's a an artist named Jane lab A
- 34:47Speaker 1: Witch or Labovich maybe she calls herself Princess at just sketch,
- 34:52Speaker 1: sent some amazing like architectural detail with it. And then
- 34:56Speaker 1: there's a guy named Ryan Burton who does erotic Simpsons art.
- 35:00Speaker 1: There you go with the etch just sketching. All three
- 35:02Speaker 1: of them are like really good at the drawings. Yeah,
- 35:07Speaker 1: the fan fick of just sketch our artists. And then
- 35:11Speaker 1: apparently if you when you're very satisfied with your et
- 35:14Speaker 1: just sketch and you don't want anything to happen to it,
- 35:17Speaker 1: you drill a hole in the back and get the
- 35:18Speaker 1: aluminum powder out, and then you lock the knobs to
- 35:22Speaker 1: keep them from being turned in. You have a net
- 35:25Speaker 1: just sketch masterpiece that you can hang in a museum.
- 35:28Speaker 1: Oh so that makes it permanent. So when the little
- 35:31Speaker 1: uh so, when a kid comes in the museum and
- 35:33Speaker 1: rips it off the wall and shakes that nothing happens. No, no,
- 35:36Speaker 1: And I think by law you're allowed to pick up
- 35:38Speaker 1: that kid and shake it. Yes, so as long as
- 35:41Speaker 1: it's not a baby, you never shake a baby. Come on,
- 35:45Speaker 1: I would never advocate shaking a baby. Everybody just want
- 35:47Speaker 1: to go on record to say that there was you know,
- 35:50Speaker 1: the comedian Nate Bargatzi. He has a he's great. He's
- 35:54Speaker 1: got a very funny bit about shaking babies. Believe it
- 35:57Speaker 1: or not, it takes a lot to turn that into
- 36:00Speaker 1: something funny. Yeah, he did it. Man, good for him.
- 36:03Speaker 1: Nate BURGOTSI huh Nate Burgotti, dude, you would love him.
- 36:06Speaker 1: He's great. So Nate Burgotti just became a cultural icon
- 36:09Speaker 1: because we did not see him coming up in this episode.
- 36:12Speaker 1: That's right. Uh, well, if you want to know more
- 36:14Speaker 1: about Nate Burgotti, you should go check him out on
- 36:16Speaker 1: the internet like I'm going to. And uh, since I
- 36:19Speaker 1: said na Purgatzi, it's time for listener mayo. Man, if
- 36:25Speaker 1: someone tells Nate, we're plugging him, plugging away, plugging Nate.
- 36:30Speaker 1: All right here, I'm gonna mention this is about Jerry
- 36:33Speaker 1: and her eating and this is from Kim Cooper. Did
- 36:36Speaker 1: you see this Jerry? She says, no, Hey, guys, I
- 36:38Speaker 1: notice that you often mentioned what Jerry is eating a
- 36:40Speaker 1: lot during the podcast. I don't know how close to
- 36:44Speaker 1: you she how close she is to your microphones. I'll
- 36:47Speaker 1: go ahead and say that from your side over there,
- 36:49Speaker 1: she's about five ft Like. All I have to do
- 36:52Speaker 1: is lean in my seat a little bit and I
- 36:54Speaker 1: can touch Jerry's miso soup. That's right. You could dip
- 36:57Speaker 1: your bumb in her soup sometimes, I threatened, I don't
- 37:01Speaker 1: know how she close she is to your microphones, but
- 37:03Speaker 1: I never hear her eating, which is good for your
- 37:06Speaker 1: fans with Misa Ponia. But I'm curious why she chooses
- 37:11Speaker 1: this time to eat. Do you guys spend all day
- 37:14Speaker 1: podcasting and that's the only time she can fit it in?
- 37:16Speaker 1: No silly question that popped into my head listening to
- 37:20Speaker 1: This Week this week after Josh said, and there's Jerry eating.
- 37:23Speaker 1: God knows what um Anyway, Guys, she's got me interested
- 37:28Speaker 1: in trying me. So I tell her she's doing a
- 37:30Speaker 1: great job because I don't know, because I know she
- 37:33Speaker 1: doesn't get too many shout outs and Josh and Chuck,
- 37:36Speaker 1: you guys are pretty great too. That is from Kim Cooper.
- 37:39Speaker 1: Thanks Kim, that's funny. She went all the way around.
- 37:42Speaker 1: Is it basically say? I guess what I'm trying to
- 37:43Speaker 1: say is I've always wanted to try me so yeah,
- 37:46Speaker 1: pretty much, we'll go try to me, so, Kim. I mean,
- 37:48Speaker 1: you can buy it at like any grocery store. Just
- 37:51Speaker 1: go get a tub of it, get a big old
- 37:53Speaker 1: spoon try your first spoonful. You can go from there.
- 37:57Speaker 1: I do you ever eat just miso paste? It's good
- 38:01Speaker 1: if you're craving something salty and savory and new. Mommy,
- 38:05Speaker 1: let's just say, um, it's good, but you can't. You
- 38:08Speaker 1: can't eat very much. But I'm just teasing him, like
- 38:11Speaker 1: a spoonful is a lot of me so paste, Okay,
- 38:14Speaker 1: what do you just add that to? Is it an ingredient? Yeah,
- 38:17Speaker 1: for like soup stuff like that. Yeah, but you can't
- 38:20Speaker 1: just seat the paste and live to tell about it.
- 38:22Speaker 1: I'm I'm proof. Well, if you want to get in
- 38:25Speaker 1: touch with us to talk about Jerry, we're always fine
- 38:27Speaker 1: with that. Um, you can go to stuff you should
- 38:31Speaker 1: Know dot com find out all of our social links
- 38:34Speaker 1: and you can always send us an email attention to everybody.
- 38:37Speaker 1: We have a new email address. Wow wow, it is
- 38:41Speaker 1: Stuff Podcast. I heart podcast network dot com. How about that?
- 38:52Speaker 1: For more on this and thousands of other topics, is
- 38:54Speaker 1: it how stuff Works dot com