6 March: Silly putty

On this date in 1950 Silly Putty was introduced to the public. 10 things you might not know about silly putty:

1. First of all, what is it? It’s a substance containing silicone polymers which is marketed as a toy. It can flow like a liquid or behave like an elastic solid.

2. Discovery of this stuff is usually credited to James Wright, who was charged, during WWII, with finding a substitute for rubber. He mixed boric acid and silicone oil together, which almost fit the bill except it melted too easily.

3. It was first sold as a toy by Ruth Fallgatter in New Haven, Connecticut. However, by 1950 she’d lost interest in it and handed it over to a marketing consultant named Peter Hodgson and the rest is history.

4. Silly putty is usually sold in Egg shaped containers. This is because when Hodgson was first marketing it, Easter was coming, and the egg shape stuck.

5. Hodgson took Silly Putty to the 1950 International Toy Fair, where it wasn’t a massive hit, although there were a few takers. Neiman-Marcus and Doubleday bookstores picked it up, and from there, The New Yorker ran some articles on the novelty product and then it took off.

6. Today, Silly Putty is owned by Crayola, and they make it in the same factory as their Crayons.

7. It has uses other than as a toy. In the home it can be used to remove dirt, lint, pet hair, or ink from various surfaces.

8. Athletes use Silly Putty to strengthen their grip—a practice popularised by football player Raymond Barry. Occupational therapists use it for rehabilitative therapy of hand injuries.

9. Silly Putty has been to space. In 1968, Apollo 8 astronauts took Silly Putty to lunar orbit with them in a specially crafted sterling-silver egg. It had a more practical purpose than something for the astronauts to play with: It was used to hold down tools in zero gravity.

10. Scientists in Ireland have found another scientific application. Mix it with graphene and, they claim, it can be used as an extremely sensitive pressure sensor. It’s so sensitive that it can measure the footprints of a Spider walking over it.