Pat Benatar and Spandex Fashion

This is an IiHart podcast Guaranteed human. And I turned off news altogether. I hate to say it, but I don't trust much of anything It's the ragebait. It feels like it's trying to divide people If we got clear facts, maybe we could calm down a little NBC News brings you clear reporting. Let's meet at the facts. Let's move forward from there NBC News, repeporting for America You're locked into a lot of things you can't change. Weather, traffic. Hey, stay in your lane! Your wireless carrier's latest price hike, but you can unlock a better way. Unlock the savings at BoostMobile and save up to six hundred dollars hundred a year. Switch to the twenty five dollars a month unlimited wireless plan. No contracts, no price hikes, and you keep your phone. Stop being locked into their games. Unlock the savings at boostmobile dot com slash unlock Based on average anual sing line payment of A and for horiz andmb customers compared twelve month on the Boost mobile limited wireless plan as of january twenty six. For full offer details visit Boost moobile d. com dot In business, there's no room for guesswork. Every shipment matters. everyvery deadline counts. When you're trying to keep operations running smoothly, the last thing you need is uncertainty. That's why reliability is at the core of USPS ground advantage package moves through a secure nationwide network tracked from dock to door with affordable upfront pricing, and delivery you can depend on. becausecause knowing your logistics are handled lets you focus on everything else. Visit uspps d. com slash ground advantage to start shipping with competidence. UPS Ground Advantage Hey there, it's Josh and it's my turn finally And I hope you're enjoying our do and science playlist so far Up next, we have our twenty seventeen 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 enlarge Welcome to Stuff You shouldh Know Fr from how stuffworks. com Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Jerry This is the stuff you should know The sick edition ye. 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 felled not once but twice in just a few months by some 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, ye, you both get a little angry like, why did this happen to me? I get more pitiful, like M Somebody help me. Oh, I've got that going on too.n't this So does that mean people have the next like eight episodes to look forward to this or? No, no, man. No W, this is it This is it right here. I think actually yesterday might have been the worst day. Oh, well good. I mean, today was a close second, but we'll find out. Yeah, it is b. I got to be a pro man. I got to I gott 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 to what we like to call dinner party factectoids The 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 twenty nine ten eleven maybe Exactly But yeah, two really cool facts in here that I think people can just keep in their hip pocket Okay. A you good? So until we get a jingle mate, I'll bet Noel 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 And then maybe like this Orwellian voice going dinner party factid Yeah, here we are eight years in still Evolving. Yeah. It's a work in 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. Good one. Yeah, it is. It makes a pretty good point 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 waistbands have been around for eons. It was basically the second thing discovered after fire is what I've always thought. still today. Since Adam first popped Eve's bra strap Right It's been around. Yeah, you'd think that's actually not the case at all. It's a Elastic itself in elastic, we should say is basically any rubber, natural or synthetic Uh thread woven with another kind of fabric, usually like say cotton or nylon 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, donon't do this because then you've 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, sureir, littleittle 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 a thrift orore underwear, then I don't know I wouldn't recommend that. I don't think they even sell it actually They do really? Yep used underwear Yes So ten percent skid free. That's probably that's got to be one of the more difficult tasks is like getting those things just prerepared for resale. You know. Yeah. I don't want to be unprepared for resale duty 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? C loose. Sure. As you got if you look really closely, you can be likeing to like the little threads that are sticking out. becauseuse some just hang limping loose. That's cotton. Nobody cares about that But the ones that are just kind of still sticking out a little bit and you can Thome 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. There were two sort of dives into making elastic and 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. 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 Iigenous peoples of the Amazon have known about it even longer. But I interrupted. you were talking about Bands 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 seven thousand years old And you bought them at goodoodwill. last week. Yeah. So this underwear originally, well, even before that, I should say, there was something called breechcloth. and that was just basically strips of leather that just kind of hung down and covered junk. kept the gats out, that kind of thing, right? Or kept them in. Yeah, if it was your things. I probably catch some Um And those are even older than the first underwear which would be considered a loining cloth. Yeah of course. which is basically and there are loin cloths that are at least five thousand years or seven thousand years old And they are It' Basically in a linen diaper that is folded in a certain way worn by grown upps, including very famously most recently, Gandhi used to wear a loincloth everywhere. It was called a Dati But it's a loing 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 agges that someone said, we can do better than this Yeah, and they brought around these things that are that were much longer than a loincloth. Most of them kind of for my research, these braays B R A I E S went below the knee even Yeah, they were like a crross between a loingcloth and jams Yeah, sort of. It says here that they were laced to the waist and legs, but There may be lace 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 will work. Yeah, for a while. I'm happy with this. And you know, then it went a different way. we should do an entire episode just on corsets I know there's a good article on the site on it But um, after Br', the what's called the union suit was invented. What, dinner party fact Okay, there you go. That's good. I never knew. I thought it was called a union toit 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 jons, even though long jons are generally two piece The onene 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. They usually button all the way up front from the groin up to the neck. Do you have any of these I'm wearing a couple pair right now, obviously. You just can't see them because they're under my clothes. Do you really have some No, I have long johns. I've got this one called Silkies that work really well. Oh yeah. but I don't have a union suit no. Do you? No, I don't anymore. My brother still Scott squears by the union suit U I think he has the classic red And then of course, they famously have like you said, the It's either called an access hatch. I've also seen them called a drop seat or a fireman's flap Yeah, I saw that too U where you can see that. Yeah, where you can unbutton your u You know, because generally, you're wearing this out in the cold So you don't want to stripped down to the naked if you want to go P or poopoo R. So you just open the old access hatch and there you have it. Yeah Now that see, that to me makes sense in the nineteenth century when the union suit was invented. Today though, it's like I guess Scott just likes to add a little panic to when he has to tinkle. likeike having to get that flap open I think he's just a classicist, not classicist. a Who' someone who's into the classic things? Classicist? Okaykay That sounds like he doesn't like poor people. That's a classist. Oh okay. That extra makes a big difference. Okay, he's a class assist then. Yeah, yeah Okay, so you should tell him this. hereere's another little sub Dinner party factoid. 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 out of hand. It was basically like remember our foot binding episode? Oh yeah. So that's basically what women in Europe and the United States in the Western countries were doing with corsets. They were engaging in What was amounted to foot binding, but with their waist. Right. They were they were literally deforming themselves right h using corsets and There was a Reformation movement against the corset and against that look. and what it spawned ultimately was the union suit, which were so great that mem were like these are ours now Right Yeah, we should do one, of course. Its I assume that They did this because men were like, no, more of an hourglass. Yeah and yeah, and I think that's where the Reformation came out of like just shut up men. Right. Do you have any like we're disfigured now thanks to you idiots. 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 O next time you see an injured friend perhaps. is if they're using an ace bandage As them what it stands for and they'll say, U 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 cott in elastic bandage. I never knew that until today. And it's been around since nineteen eighteen, apparently. Yeah that the three M company introduced it. Amazing Um And so so okay, you've got an ace bandage which is essentially an elastic waistband used to keep Shaq's elbow in place, right? Shquil O'Neil? Yeah All right U What you might think this is. what what's crazy is This is nineteen eighteen that that three M introduced the ace. and it took until the forties before somebody thought Why would we just like attach undernderpants, a lowing cloth. Yeah to that That is weird. Pull it up, snap it in place and be like, oh, baby Modal I guess because 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 agree. you know. I mean, that's what u that's what William Harris says. He says it was basically a sort of fashion inertia That everything was fine. like you could use buttons or ties or something like that and keep it in place. So who cares? Yeah. But it's just so much easier to pull up your underpants, snap them in place and go, Oh, baby 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 or I at work Yeah, it's amazing to watch come into work, you're like, what the hell is this loom doing here? Well, not at your job, but you know, I know what you mean sure. I was just being a wise. If you ever seen a loom doing its thing? it's pretty impressive. 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 width wise threads 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 Y, well, that's exactly what it would be. There would be at least three guys wearing vests in that band. for sure that may have been woven with a loom Yeah, right, you know And maybe pocka watchatches with the chains. Oh tootally. Yeah. But that's all Lom does. It goes, you know, it allows this interlacing to take place and that's what's happening with elastic, it just takes the place of the yarn. And it's it's well, part of the yarn, half of the yarn or a portion of the yarn Well, yeah, because in the case of a 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 a type of fiber woven together with some sort of rubber and to create this new Stretchy resesilient fabric. pllastic. You wantan to take a nose blow break? Die here. Thank you, Charles. Sure Hey everybody, I'm Bobby Bones. Today we're talking about Thomas Red and the soundtrack to Life Tour. For over a decade, Thomas Red has delivered more than twenty number one hits and sold out tours. Inspired by his family and his Nashville roots, he's created songs that have become the soundtrack to our lives. From Diia happappy Man to lifeife Changes, You've heard his songs playing at life special moments. Now it's time to hear them live Round up your friends to catch Thomas Rretett on the soundtrack to Life Tour Get your tickets now at live nation. com Your pet is your bestie? Your therapist, your perfect match. It's easy to love them. It's easy to protect them too, with pet insurance coverage from Pet's Best. because it's all fun and games until they chew on something they shouldn't. And you get a vet bill to match. With perfect timing, Pets's bestest helps protect your furry friend and your budget from this imperfect world Get up to ninety percent cash back on eligible vet bills from less than a dollar a day. Petsets Best has plans to cover accidents, injuries, and more. fromrom puppies and kittens to seniors. Find Y your perfect match plan. And get a quote at petsbest dot com dot Pet inssurance products offered and administered by Pets Best Insurance Services LLC are underwritten by American Pet insurance Company or Indpendence American insurance compomp. Forerm and conditions visit wWW dot petsbest dot com backslash policy Products underwritten by American Pet inssurance Comany, Independents American insurance compomany or MSransverse inssurance compompany and administered by Petets Best Insurance Services LLC. one dollar day premium based on twenty four average new policyholder data for accident and illness plans pets age zero to ten Why is it always chaos when we link up? Because nobody plants anything, bro. Good thing the Rue's ready like that. For real, rain, dirt, whatever. Available all wheel drive, five modes we still outside. And they got some kick too. That turbo? Torque is crazy. The most in its class, it moves, moves. Rogue doesn't mess around and peep the space Merch on merch, gear, mics, all the fits. Load up, We out. twenty twenty six Nissan Rogue, built for all of it. Auto Pacific segmentation, twenty twenty six roogue versus latest in market competitors in the XSUV mainstream midsightize class, excluding electrical vehicles based on manufactured websites Stone of you sure. All right, we're back. You good Yeah, I should say also like I keep hammering home. what the definition of elastic is. Now we're talking about elastic waistbands and that's what you think of typically, but againgain, 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. R 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 Sandex later, but That stuff is in many, many, many garments that you wear today. You may realize that you have this stuff in your clothing. Right Everything from the the neck of your shirt perhaps to maybe tongue of your shoes sometimes. Yeah, fancy shoes will have elastic in them thoseose jeans that you wear a Thanksgiving dinner They have an elastic wasate Oh, I know what jeans you're talking about. I don't wear those Pleated jeans, which is just weird looking That is where button flies No, yeah. so you just go pop Yep pop a couple out you're all set. That's right. You can stuff a lot of extra bits in there Uh, All right, so let's u Should we get the way back machine a bit and go back to the eighteenth and I guess the nineteenth and eighteenth centuries, huh? Yeah 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 humumanities magazine website. And this guy wrote an article about how just thoroughly we misunderstand pirates.. how our conception of pirates took place basically In one decade between seventeen, I think twenty six and thirty six. And everything we think of as pirates is crammed into that ten years. Everything before and after is totally different from our conception of pirates in that they were actually very frequently, they were just sailors who would go attack like a vessel in the Indian Ocean for one big haul 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 someome 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 eighteen years ago No, we wouldn't have known that. This is a brand new article. I'm sure we just totally fell for everything. Right And apparently that's it's not Like that's not our fault. this guy's article and idea is re prettytty new. It's just one of these things that historically everyone kind of bought in on. Interesting S me that way You got it. All right. so we're talking pirates here, not just pirates, but sailors, explorers. Basically, anyone who got on a ship in the seventeen and eighteen hundreds early eighteen hundreds and exxploring 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, Ohh my God, what is this? Let me bring it back. Yeah in cinnamon, rememember our 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 Couchk Nice. And it's an Indian term meaning weeping wood and it's basically what they're talking about are is it an actual rubber tree Havia Brazilinesis the rubber tree, which literally Oozes. Milky latex. Yeah, naturally Yeah, and the earliest sailors that encountered the indigenous natives of the Amazon We're like, what's that stuff you're like putting on your outerwear and it's keeping the rain out or What's that weird flexible bottle you're using. And they explained it to them and those guys said, awwesome. 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 in liquid form every night after dinner? They said, Ohah Huska. Yeah. And they went, we'll take some of that home too. Yeah. Can we get a too bag of that stuff U so yeah they they were already using the stuff because they found out when When it was dried out, basically, you could use it for a lot of things. likeike you said, bottles. shoes It's just like this,, flexible rubbery material. Yeah, right. So everything's hunky Dory. this is a brand new thing. Europe starting to go crazy for it What they figured out quickly was that you you couldn't do a lot with it, right? As 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. Yeah it has a narrow range of temperatures that allow its usefulness, right? So once you take it 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 Priestlely actually came up with a dinner party factoid that I'm sure you'd love to share Uh ooh, which one Oh, you didn't, this wasn't one of them? No, blue mine on the two. Joseph Priestley, who is very famous chemist, Jason Priestley's great uncle He made that same joke in the anesthesia episode. I'll bet we did Yeah. because yeah, that's where he popped up. That's right. Thanks for that. Oh, and the nitrous oxide one too.. 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 in pencil and then I'm rubbing this This latex. Oh Kahachuk. And it's rubbing out the pencil marks And that gave rise to the term rubber Oh, that's how the name Yeahah came around. Yep from rubbing from rubbing out pencil marks, erasing. Rubber. Interesting. because remember the British love to change everything with an on the end. like soccer is actually shortened association football, like a soccer. Uu became soccer, right There. Rubber That's pretty interesting. I don't know how I screw it past that one I love that one. So it became a big deal and everyone you know, that had a little money to invest thought, Hey, we can make a lot of dough with this stuff we can transform that into Something useful like let's say in a garment But like you said, they had this problem that it was a very narrow range of temperatures where they could find it useful. So couple of dudes started working on it. We've talked about Mr. Charles Goodyear before we talk about himing I don't know. But I rem I mean, definitely the Goodyar Blimps episode. But 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 've talked about this before, yeah. We haven't done this entire episode, have we? No, 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 another guy named Thomas Hancock, an English inventor partnered with a dud named Charles Mcintosh. and they started making raincoats basically. Yeah, the MacIintosh the classic Macintosh. Yeah. And so Charles Thomas Hancock was already pretty well situated to Who's already working on it, right? Yeah. But Charles Goodyear had that breakthrough first and it was actually a really big deal that he had this breakthrough. in the early eighteen thirties, Charles Goodye Basically became obsessed with cracking the rubber coat. He just knew it could be used to be made into something useful, right? Yeah and He became so personally committed to it. He All of his investors went away. He went into debtors's prison so regularly, he referred to it as his hotel. Six of his twelve children didn't make it to adulthood. They were just that poor. Oh man. They had to sell their dinnerware, so he made plates for them out of rubber. It was really, really rough. So the idea that he had this breakthrough Um was just enormously rewarding for him, 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 reverse engineered it 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 it was hardy under all kinds of temperature ranges. It would always snap back. Yep Well, not always and forever, which we'll get to later too As you know, that waistband will sometimes leave you disappoint eventually Wh why you end up buying new underwear Um, Well, one of a couple of reasons you find new one. take it to the thrift store. Yeah, exactly U But yeah, he that is what vulcanization is. and Hancock and Macintosh what they were doing they didn't correct that code first, but they They developed called something called the Masticator. Basically, they had been making elastic threads by slicing it from rubber bottles and raw rubber, but there was just so much waste. they developed this machine called a masticator. and it would basically chew up this rubber and make it into meld it together and make it into a big single sheet material, which was really helpful, but they still had that temperature problem until Goodyear hit it Right And again, they reverse engineered Goodyear' process went and filed a patent on vulcanization. Yeah they rip him off like fully? Yes. Wow. fully. And apparently it was one of those ones like the phone where Goodyear went to go file a patent and found out that someone else had that Hancock had just a few weeks earlier. So took him to court. In order to settle, Hancock offered Goodyear fifty percent of the patent to drop the lawsuit And Goodyear said no and he lost the case and he died broke. Oh man. but he was able to He was able to generate enough royalties so that his kids were' able to live the good life thanks to him But yeah, he got ripped off for sure. And one other thing about about Charles Goodyear, The Goodyear Rubber or tire and rubber company, he had nothing to do with it. They named it after him in honor of him. Oh wow. Yeah, I thought that was pretty cool. You don't watch the TV show Shark tank, do you Do not. I think I've asked you that before. You know, the whole concept right is these people pitch their businesses to them. Yeah, well surrounded by sharks swimming. Well that's it Now they pitch them to the sharks and they either invest or they don't. Eone kind of knows the show, but you, I guess Um But u I'm always at home just yelling at these people when they'll offer up like twenty percent of their company and then they'll get offered an investment from a shark for you know and say, but they want like forty percent. And some of these people like turn around and walk away, which On one hand, I kind of respect that they don't want to give away that much of their company But like I'm always just thinking, wouldn't you rather own sixty percent of a twenty million dollar company, then eighty percent of a three million dollars company 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't know Who's that company though that that u Turned down a billion dollars from Either Google or Facebook and just kept at it and now it's my space. No I can't it's one of like the big social media brands that you know of. That was just worth goobbs more money reallyally? 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 right. I'm always kind of like, manan Take the money now and run. As Steve Miller suggested. Did you know Steve Miller's a scientologist Is he really? Yeah Boy, he went off on the rock and ro hall of Fame this year. Why did they not vote for nominating him? No, no, no. he got inducted in like basically trash them on his way in and out the door. Wh? Oh you'll just have to read it. It's kind of too long to get into, but they were none too happy, I think. He came across as just a really crabby old guy. Oh he didn't have like a point or anything. No, he had points, but Yeah. you'll just have to check it out. I will we're already getting sid trracked here we've been sidetracked, baby. So when regardless of who came up with it, even though it was Charles Goodyear, once vulcanization was introduced to the world, all of a sudden, all these dreams of what you could do with a flexible, durable material that could withstand tremendous pressure and force and heat Um And cold too, which was a big one All of a sudden the whole world just opened up. And What was interesting, Chuck was because it also dovetailed with the Industrial Revolution Brazil which was 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 all like virtually within a year or so Yeah, and that was true. for a long time until about the mid late about eighteen seventy six when these British businessmen said I'm going to sneak these rubber tree seeds out take them back to England and We're going to see if these things grow in Southeast Asia where we have a lot of British colonies. and it turns out it did. And just about thirty five years later, the center of the global rubber market shifted to Malaysia, Singapore, and Sri Lanka. 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. U becausecause that meant that these were these were British colonies, 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, we need more rubber, please? Yeah. U, which is I think how they would order it So everything's going hunky dory at least as far as the British and Americans are concerned. The rubber supply is being fulfilled thanks to Malaysia, Singapore, Sri Lanka. 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 four good tires Made of rubber. Yeah. And then World War two really, really increased the need for rubber I think here it says that in total The Pentagon said that they needed thirty two pounds of rubber for every single ground troop in one way or another. R That's amazing. Yeah, and that's why it was such a big deal that the Japanese invaded the Pacific becausecause the Pacific Theater featured those countries that were the rubber producing capital of the world, that had been under British control And u Now all of a sudden, our rubber supply was either cut off or in danger So the United States led by FDR said, hey, four biggest rubber companies, we're going to get together and we need to come up with a synthetic rubber to suite. Let's get on it. We're all going to split the patent evenly and let's get to work And in eighteen months they had come up with a synthetic rubber. Amazing And we'll get to synthetics a bit more in a minute, but jumping back to the mid eighteen hundreds, the story of the Rubber band is pretty interesting. These two chaps, Stephen Perry, and Thomas Barnabas Daft great name TBD, actually invented the rubber band, the modern what we know is the rubber band because they started slicing these 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 Except people who ate asparagus. That was a good one, man And today, they still kind of do it in the same way rubber band wise. They create this they mix this latex together with all these chemicals, it depends on, you know, what kind of rubber band you're making And they get this raw rubber compound into a long hollow tube slip it over a round pipe called the mandrel expose that to high heat and pressure to volcanize it cures it and then they slice that up into rubber bands Pretty neat It is pretty neat You want to take a break and then talk some more about how it's made to this Hey everybody, I'm Bobby Bones. Today we're talking about Thomas Red and the soundtrack to Life Tour. For over a decade, Thomas Red has delivered more than twenty number one hits and sold out tours. Inspired by his family and his Nashville roots, he's created songs that have become the soundtrack to our lives. From Diia happappy Man to lifeife Changes, You've heard his songs playing at life special moments. Now it's time to hear them live Round up your friends to catch Thomas Rretett on the soundtrack to Life Tour Get your tickets now at live nation. com Protect yourour Pet withith insurance from Petsvest. Plans start from less than a dollar a day. Visit petsvest d. com Pet insurance products offered and administered by Petsest Insuranceervices LLC or underwritten by Aican Pet inssurance Comany or independence American insurance compompany. For terms and conditions, visit wWW d. petsbest dot com backslash policy Products are underwritten by American Pet insurance Company, independence Americ insurance company or MS Tverse insurance comppany, and administered by Pets Best Insur Services LLC. one dollar day premium based on twenty four average new policyholder data for accident and illness plans, pEets age zero to ten Bro from the show last night to this drive, why is it never chill? Beause this is our live. backstage on the road. It's loud, messy, real. And that's the best part. whole crew, no plan, just moving. Good thing Nissan builds for that kind of chaos. Not just test tracks, real life scenes, late nights, road trips, all of it That's why it holds up. Nissan was rriankged number one in initial quality among mainstream brands by JD Power. Yeah, you can tell! twenty twenty six Nissan Rogue built for what really happens. For JDPower twenty twenty five US initialQualality stududy award information, visit JDpower dot com slash awards. Awards based on twenty twenty five model year, newer models may be shown D Some of you should know All right, so we've been talking about rubber in its most natural form. And how they transform that into usable rubber is pretty remarkable. But Immediately after Worldar IIo, like we were talking about, this creation of synthetic rubber was probably the second biggest invention. all time. Well, maybe not of all time. It's up there though. Yeah, but when it comes to stretchy things for sure And apparently the World War two research and development produced not just one, but three different types of easasily manufactured synthetic rubbers. Yeah. One was a butidiene rubber, anotherother was a styrene butyidiene rubber. and that was the one that the government went with for World War two. Right. And it was actually ripped off from a German from the Germans, which they hadd come up with something similar previously And then there's an ethylene propylene monomer And all three of those make up most of today's synthetic rubbers. Yeah, and they found that this 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, I keep teasing like we're going to get to that, in which we will. But they found it was really well suited to replace rubber. Well, in most applications, an industrial application like a tire or a fanbell or something like that. but 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 nineteen fifty nine. and by they, 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, right? That's right And they 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. Y. And those tiny little threads were a magical creation known as spandex The trade name of which originally is Lycra It's amazing. and 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 remained really stable when it washed and dried at 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 and most importantly Chk, it would snap back. It would retain its original shape Right afterfter being stretched. So yeah, Spandex changed everything. I didn't realize it was from the fifties. I didn'ter really Yeah And William Harris makes a pretty good point. He says that Sandex might be considered the modern elastic. Like it is it's basically the base of anything stretchy that you use today. Yeah. and it said here, we said it's in all kinds of stuff. They said it's in about eighty percent of all clothing bought by Americans. So even if you don't think Sandex is in something, It may have a little spandex in there. It's in eighty percent of all clothing bought by Americans, one hundred percent of all spandex pants bought by Americans Think about that stat for a little while. Yeah, it's amazing Yeah, including Jegggs, he points out. He calls them pajama jeans, but I've always called them Jeggs. Oh Is that the same thing I believe so, yeah eresting. We can't hope so. Emily, when we put him on her daughter, she calls him jazz pants Oh yeah, that's a good one too. But that's I think usually due to the pattern more than the snap back 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 Yes, and because I don't understand chemistry. at all Take it away I'll get 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. the end So rubber, whether it's natural or synthetic, is a polymer. Yes Right? And it's a specific kind of polymer called an elastomer an elastic polymer has stretchiness and resilience. It's flexible.. 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. And the units are called monomers. and 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. Yeah. Still other kind of polymers say like a plastic or a resin are crystalline in structure And they fit so well together, they're also rigid and not very flexible either.. Then you have elastomers, which are a kind of polymer. And because of their molecular structure Um They are super flexible, super stretchy, and they snap back into place Yeahes, and normally there' I mean, they liken it into this article like a coiled like a big mass of snakes. Yeah. But they have this really neat quality. these elastomers when you apply forge to it The molecullees actually straighten out in the direction that you're pulling it. and that's sort of the snap backack you're talking about. But as soon as you release it It goes back to that coiled up arrangement When you pull it, when you apply force, they line up basically like those snakes head to tail in one single long line. That's a scary snake. Yeah. And then when you release it, it goes back into its original form of 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 glass transition temperature is actually pretty Low. Yeah, this is where I kind of just got foggy So this 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 the 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 Lo. glass transition temperature relative to what we have as normal temperatures outside in the world or in our homes or whatever is going to be flexible and floppy anything with a high glass transition temperature is going to be rigid and hard and not flexible. So 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 piece of rubber, natural rubber, and youl you applied the temperature of negative seventy degrees Celsius or negative ninety four 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 prevulcanized rubbers. Yeah they would fall apart because the glass transition temperature is not like an exact moment the where the thing converts from flexible to rigid It's the median of a large thermal window where it starts to get get crystalline and rigid and then it' completely crystalline and rigid on the other end. So of course, you would think if you get down to say twenty degrees like it would in Boston or New York in the nineteenth century, and you're walking around with rubber soled 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 vulcanization They heat that up with sulfur And that makes those polymer chains linked 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 even when you apply intense heat or extreme cold It will maintain its molecular shape Y, 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 This elastic eventually will lose that snap backack due to oxidization. oxidization Oxidation I like oxidization U 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 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 vulcanization, what you're doing is adding sulfur to the polymer Right? Yeah And if it would it would make sense then that either UV radiation or something else could break those bonds between the sulfur and 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 in cold weather Like if you take you take a pair of underwear out and like, you know, negative twenty degrees in Minnesota and you start really stretching it out a lot, it's going to it's going to lose its elasticity really fast. Oh yeah Anybody from Minnesota can tell you that. Yeah, that mean, who know they may have to u buy more underwear than like, Hawaii, I have no idea. They all wear union suits up there. No, that's true So u You want to finish with Pat Benitar Oh man, let's bring her out. Some onat. I' gonna do an acoustic set. manan, how great would that be So u We did a little digging and we' trying to figure out who basically started the eighties Sandex rocker trend. Yeah Rockers Bandex trech. 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 Benetar has been a musician for much longer than I realized. Right. apparently the whole thing happened on Halloween of nineteen seventy seven. Awesome And by this time Pat Benitar 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 Mon. Have you seen that movie? 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 Sandex. So she dressed up in some a spandex get upp deceided to play a show that night at Catcher Rising Star, which is basically her house club. You ever been there? No, I haven't either. Is it still around? I don't know. is it? I think I know of it from like comomedy Central in the nineties. Yeah, I think that was the name of a show. But I think it was from that club. Oh wasas it filmed there? Yeah, I think so.. Could be wrong Anyway, she was used to playing shows there, but she played the show in this get up the Sandex getit upp and noticed that the crowd was like into it a lot more than usual then I said, Wowy, wow, what's she wearing