9 Delightful Facts about Office Supplies

and now you can't throw it away. Yes, I got one of those sitting right here, But I don't think I've ever bought a paperweight. If you it's not like I live in a windy house, right anything. Yeah, I can't say that I've ever saved up to buy a paperway, But apparently there's quite a market for them, and Capodi

had an amazing eye for them. According to the Paris Review, he went to the auctions in Europe and Asia just to see these things, and he'd check out thrift shops and even buy them for like twenty bucks and they turned out to be worth like four thousand dollars and four thousand dollar paperweight. This isn't something I made up. He really did this stuff. But I mean, like, unless you're using a diamond for a paperweight, I really don't

see how it could be worth that much. I don't know, but he loved them, and Capodi actually had one in his collection that was from Italy, a Mili Fiori and it was worth seven thousand dis Apparently he called paper weights a quote fragment of a dream. But after finding that story, I thought we should do today's nine Things on office supply, So let's dig in. Hey, their podcast listeners,

welcome to part time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good friend man guest shot Ticketer and the other side of that soundproof glass shuffling folders around in his Lamborghini trapper that day, and that's our pal and producer Ston McNeil. I know we love our office here at how stuff works. And actually I've seen you bring your kids in a few times and do they love coming into the office here? Of course,

I mean they think it's such a treat. I don't know if you do, but I I used to go to my dad's office and this is when he worked at the Experimental Station at DuPont, which was their big research facility and I remember thinking it was just so exotic, right, like it was the secret world he'd go to do important things. And when I was there, I get to peek into his lab set up that he had near his desk. It was super cool. I mean, my kids just like coming to the office here because Tamika and

Ember keep it stocked with candy and snacks. But actually, you know, I think it's from coming in. But my my daughter is obsessed with having meetings with her friends now, Like she just keeps talking about meetings. She's got to go to a recess and meetings she's got with her friends after school. And I think it's because I'm always rushing off to meetings and and so what does she do with these meetings? Mostly she just comes in and a hoff and says, oh, honor, and I had to

cancel our meeting today. It's so annoying. And you'll be like why and she'll say, you know, a monster attack. That sounds pretty accurate. And that's kind of what happens with us. Well, we we started the show off talking about paper weight, So so where do you want to go from their mango? I think I'm gonna start with pencils. So do you remember the sudoku trend from like a decade or so ago. Yeah, it was everywhere. And actually this is a short aside, but I remember one of

our editors, that our book publisher. She was telling us how it was her job to edit sudoku and that there was basically no difference between them. You could get them an easy, medium or hard, but yeah, that there's no personality to the things. So her job was to come up with different book covers and so she turned them into like a salsa jar cover or have them say like mild, medium or spicy and like that, which I'm sure gets like challenging after a while, right, Like

how many categories can you come up with? But here's what I wanted to say about pencils. So, after sudoku took off in England, the Chicago Tribute in report that pencil sales in the country went up seven hundred percent. Isn't that insane? That is? Yeah, But there's also a bonus pencil fact I have here. Part of the reason that NASA uses pens in space is because sharpening pencil

sends all these wooden flakes into the air. I mean, that's pretty obvious, but first, they switched to mechanical pencils before they made the move to pens, and this was

in nineteen five. NASA ordered thirty or so mechanical pencils from a company and paid about a hundred thirty dollars for each one, and there was actually so much outrage from the public about spending that much money on pencils that they switched to pens, which of course means astronauts have to be extra careful when they do their sudoku in space. I mean, that is crazy. But all right, well, speaking of mistakes, did you know what they used to

use before rubber erasers? Apparently they used wheat red and and and it had to be wheat I think, not rye or pumpernickel. And anyway, this comes from mental flaws. But in seventeen seventy, a guy named Edward name was writing and made an error, so he reached for his leftover wheat loaf, I guess, and he accidentally grabbed a piece of rubber and started a racing and was delighted when he realized it performed even better than the wheat bread.

That sounds like a terrible life hack, right, Like, we're on the race around your pencils. Just stuff some bread and there instead. Doesn't it seem like the pencil markings would just get all smudgy, Like I can't imagine it works that well. Well, we'll have to try this one out later, all right, So what's your next one? Well, how about we move on to the stapler. So if you loved the classic movie Office Space, you probably remember the character Milton and his red swing Line stapler that

he was obsessed with. So you know, after the movie came out, it bombed in theaters, but it did well on DVD, and Swing Line started getting tons of calls for their red stapler. The only problem was Swing Line never actually made a red stapler. The one in the movie had been custom painted by a prop designer I guess to make it pop off the screen or whatever.

So people actually made a business of it. They started d I wining it, they spray painted their own, and suddenly there was this hot market on eBay for it, and eventually, like swing Line, wise and up and at least a quote rio red version to quality demand. I love that people can get attached enough to a concept in a movie that they like need a red staplers such a weird thing. All right, Well, here's a quick

one about a post it notes. There's of course a well known origin story where scientists created a very weak glue that no one knew how to use, and eventually he used it for temporary bookmarks and his hymnal and it kind of took off from there. What's interesting is that for something so temporary, they actually have quite a bit of sticking power. So post it note actually survived on a trip from Vegas to Minneapolis on the nose

of a jet. It was put there as a reminder for the Vegas ground crew, but it clung on through five hundred mile per hour speeds and minus fifty six degree temperatures. Isn't that crazy? Yeah, I mean it's like the little post it that could definitely was. But all right, so where do you want to take it from here? So I've actually got a great story that Christopher told me about, and it's about the highlighter. And you know how they always come in these fat and flat shapes,

So this is something I've never thought about. But the story is really funny. So apparently this guy, Gunter Schwanhauser for from the Schwan pencil factory. You know the schwan pencil factory, right of pencil factory. Well, you've seen a highlighter in the US in this nineties seventies, and he wanted to release his own version back in Germany. So he had his technicians and designers bring him a bunch

of these like clay prototypes for some reason. But when he saw them, he was completely irritated, like none of them had the right ergonomic field or something, and it didn't feel right in his hand. So in his anger, he slammed his fist down on the clay models and when he looked at the flattened shaped he was like, this is genius, Like that's the shape that feels good in your hand, and uh, I mean, I just think

that's so cool. But he also called the product the boss because busses don't write things, they just point out important things that other people right, And I imagine a guy named Gunter schwan Hauser would would slam his fist down every once in a while. Definitely. Well here's something neither of us are fancy enough to own, and that's fifteen hundred dollar business cards for one card, or for

like a set of them, apparently one card. So this is from two thousand twelve where a company called Black Ask from in England started making a card of Swiss metal construction and more than thirty carrots of diamonds were in each card. I mean, if I got handed one

of those, I just think you're really bad at business. Yeah, someone must be buying the custom handcrafted cards are sold in packs of twenty, three, fifty or one hundred, and just because you're wealthy doesn't mean you can purchase them. They're only obtainable through an exclusive invite. I love that sort of pomposity, like you have to be invited to throw away your money. Here's right, right. I know we've got a couple more facts to share before we declare winner.

But let's take a quick break for Welcome back to Part time Genius, and we're talking facts about office supplies. Now, Mango, it's your last fact, So what do you want to talk about. I want to talk about cubicles, which are always a touchy subject, and they were touching at our

last office. And I'm sure you remember this, like some people love them, some people felt closed off from all the conversations around them, and and you know, we kept experimenting with the office design, like we had big cubes and then these more open office spaces. But but did you realize that cubicles were actually designed to free office workers from their uninspired workplace settings. Yeah, this is another

thing Christopher told me. But the things were originally called the action office and was meant to free workers from the tyranny of those classroom style offices that you see in old movies where like all these deaths are in the big hall face the same way. But the designer, who's named Robert Probst, he designed them in the sixties and actually hated how they were used in the eighties and nineties. And and this is how he put it. The dark side of this is that not all organizations

are intelligent. Lots are run by crass people who can take the same kind of equipment and create hell holes. They make little bitty cubicles and stuff people in these barren rat hole places. Wow, he was not a fan. You know. I always love that book from Quirk about how to wallpaper your cubicle and make it like tiki themed, or how to design it so it was like your cabin in the woods or something like that. I know,

it's so great, So well, what's your last fact? All right, So, just like cubicles and open offices, another thing that goes in and out of fads seems to be desk chairs and and right now, standing desk are obviously super popular. We can just look around in the office here and see so many people using them. I know, I feel like it made this like progression right from like these super ergonomic chairs to yoga balls for a while, suddenly like everyone was bouncing on yoga poulse and now all

of a sudden everyone is standing. Oh that's right. But apparently none of this is new. The ministers have been preaching standing desk since at least seventeen nineties seven, when this Presbyterian minister his name was job Orton, he was telling people that a sedentary life was dangerous and he claimed that quote, it must be your resolute care to keep your body upright as possible, never stoop your head or bend your breast. To prevent this, you should get

a standing desk. That's crazy that he used this exactly where. It's like he kind of should have trademark them, right. Yeah, And another minister in eighteen thirty six, this guy was named Ebeny's reporter claimed that the standing desk is good for those quote who have the animal vigor to sustain the exhaustion and occasions. Animal vigor, you know, that's what it takes. But if you're on the fence about using a standing desk, you should know there are some historical

figures who were early adopters. Thomas Jefferson used what he called a tall desk to draw blueprints, and Winston Churchill also used the standing desk to lay out galley proofs. I mean, Churchill also used to spend half his day naked in a bathtub, like drinking straight in martiniz. So that's how. I'm not sure I need to follow his model, but I do like knowing that this trend has come full circle. And since you've changed my mind on standing this, I want you to take home today's trophy and use

it as a paperweight. All right, Well, thanks so much, and that's it for today's episode. We will be back with a full length episode tomorrow. Thanks so much for listening.