10 Great Innovations That Were Discovered by Mistake
From cornflakes to the pacemaker, some of our most beloved—and useful—products were born of blunders
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Mistakes are in the DNA of the U.S.A.: Christopher Columbus was trying to find a westward route from Europe to Asia when he discovered the New World.
Since then, the U.S. has repeatedly proved itself to be the land of luck. Harnessing happenstance has led to inventions that have changed the world—from extending the lives of cardiac patients to overhauling how humans eat. It even gave bored fingers little air bubbles to pop.
“People underestimate how improbable the improbable is,” says Christian Busch, a University of Southern California business-school professor and the author of “The Serendipity Mindset.”
Call it what you will: chances, providence, fluke, good fortune. For 250 years, it hasn’t been Archimedes in a bathtub, but tinkerers in workshops and scientists in labs, embracing—and capitalizing on—their blunders.
Here are 10 U.S. innovations born of mistakes:
Cornflakes
The Battle Creek Sanitarium, a world-renowned health spa in the eponymous Michigan city, drew fans of what today we’d call wellness culture. Dr. John Harvey Kellogg oversaw the facility, which preached exercise, fresh air and eating a healthy diet, which included dried and crumbled grains.
Kellogg and his younger brother, W.K. Kellogg, were experimenting with various ways to cook wheatberries. In 1894, the pair accidentally left a pot of boiled wheat to stand, and it dried out. When W.K. returned, he put the wheat through rollers. Each berry came out as a single large, flat flake that crisped when baked.
The junior Kellogg later applied that to corn—and changed breakfast forever. In 1906, he launched the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Co.; today you know it as the cereal giant Kellogg.
Implantable pacemaker
Wilson Greatbatch saved millions of lives—without ever going to medical school. Once in the late 1950s, while building machinery to record sounds a heart makes, he accidentally used the wrong resistor, but its electrical pulse rate was steady, like a heartbeat.
“I stared at the thing in disbelief and then realized that this was exactly what was needed to drive a heart,” Greatbach wrote in his book “The Making of the Pacemaker.”
At the time, pacemakers existed but were external and huge. Previous ones had to be hand-cranked. His lightbulb moment? Put tiny versions into cardiac patients to regulate heartbeats. The first wholly implantable pacemaker was placed in a dog in 1958 and in a human two years later.
Microwave
Maybe Percy Spencer was hungry. Shortly after World War II had ended, the Raytheon engineer had a candy bar in his pocket when he approached a magnetron—and realized his sweet treat was melting. He had discovered that electromagnetic energy could be used to heat food quickly. He tested it on popcorn and eggs.
Early models of what Raytheon called the Radarange were too large and pricey for at-home use. In 1967, a household countertop microwave made its debut; it cost less than $500. The following decade, food manufacturers expanded their product lines to include more microwavable dinners and snacks. Today, almost all U.S. households have at least one microwave, according to the most recent federal data.
Bubble Wrap
In 1957, Alfred W. Fielding and Marc Chavannes were trying to create a new kind of textured wallpaper by attaching two plastic sheets together, but pockets of air got stuck in between. The textured wall covering wasn’t a hit, but after bit of a do-si-do, they hit on cushioning for packages.
As years went by, the company Fielding and Chavannes founded expanded its wrap options to include a variety of bubble sizes. For those who really love popping the little buggers, you can say a word of thanks to the lucky inventors on Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day on the last Monday of January.
Vulcanized rubber
Rubber was popular in the early 19th century because it was waterproof and flexible. One problem, though: Untreated rubber becomes brittle when exposed to cold, and tacky and runny when hot. That limited its usefulness in the U.S.—and became Charles Goodyear’s obsession.
In 1839, after years of trying, he cracked the code for the uncrackable after rubber he had treated with sulfur somehow came in contact with a hot stove. When Goodyear examined the sample, he was stunned: Instead of melting, it became sturdy and durable without losing its flexibility and elasticity. Applying heat was counterintuitive, explained Charles Slack, author of “Noble Obsession: Charles Goodyear, Thomas Hancock, and the Race to Unlock the Greatest Industrial Secret of the Nineteenth Century.” The term “vulcanization” comes from Vulcan, the Roman god of fire.
Popsicles
Frank Epperson accidentally hit upon his innovation at the ripe old age of 11. In 1905, after a long day of playing, he left a stirrer in his cup of soda outside overnight. The next morning, with a quick flip upside down, Epperson had a sweet icicle with a built-in handle, which he dubbed the Epsicle.
His friends loved his portmanteaued frozen confection, which he patented in 1924. Epperson later changed the name, at his children’s suggestion, to a Pop’s ‘Sicle, or Popsicle. Later that decade, he sold his rights to Joe Lowe Co., which started to offer a two-stick version during the Great Depression. Popsicle passed through various corporate hands over the decades; Magnum Ice Cream, a Unilever spinoff, now owns it.
Saran Wrap
Ralph Wiley was a Dow Chemical scientist for decades, but at the time of his best-known discovery, he was just a college student working there. One day in 1933, he and a colleague noticed that a dry-cleaning agent they were working with had turned the flask white. Researchers wanted to know why but had a hard time scraping it off the flask to study it. That cling—the result of tightly packed molecules—became key.
Say hello to saran. During the early days of World War II, the Army used it as an inexpensive wrap to keep equipment on boats dry. Postwar, the flexible, clinging film became a kitchen favorite, keeping out water and air to keep food fresh and protected.
Saccharin
Constantin Fahlberg’s tasty innovation in 1879 was caused by every mother’s nightmare: not washing your hands before eating.
The Johns Hopkins University researcher was so engrossed in the lab that he forgot about supper. In a rush to grab a bite, Fahlberg didn’t wash up. When he put a piece of bread in his mouth, it tasted very sweet. He’d inadvertently created a compound from chemicals he’d been working with——and it got on his hand and the bread. Fahlberg stopped eating, raced back to the lab and began tasting the contents of every container. He found the one that “out-sugared sugar,” and then spent months trying to replicate its chemical composition.
Saccharin grew popular during World War I sugar shortages and later became a favorite of dieters.
Scotchgard
Patsy Sherman, a 3M chemist, had been working on a new type of rubber for the Air Force that could withstand exposure to jet fuel when in 1953, lab worker Joan Mullin accidentally spilled some of Sherman’s sample on her tennis shoes. Mullin tried unsuccessfully to get it off using soap, alcohol and other solvents.
Sherman saw potential in the sneaker mishap. She, along with her supervisor, Sam Smith, developed the water and stain repellent Scotchgard. It had its debut in 1956, but it had some drawbacks; for instance, it worked well on wools but not on cottons. Scotchgard was perfected by 1960.
Post-it Notes
3M scientist Spencer Silver was tasked with creating a tough and strong adhesive for aircraft construction; instead, in 1968, he discovered one that stuck lightly to surfaces and could be easily removed. But he had trouble finding a use for it. Jump-cut to his colleague Art Fry a few years later. That scientist was annoyed that the scraps of paper he used to mark hymns for his church choir would fall out by Sunday.
Fry remembered a talk he had attended about Silver’s light adhesive. He began using it as a hymnal bookmark—and a use was born. 3M employees tested them around the office and adored them. Post-it Notes were introduced in 1980.
Fun fact: That Post-it Notes were originally yellow was happenstance, too; that’s the color scrap paper the lab next door had available.
Fun lie: The titular characters in the 1997 comedy movie “Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion” claimed they invented the office staple to impress their former classmates.
