Sybil Bruncheon's HIT-OR-MISS Histories... Fascinating Inventions:

... Ah, yes... the famous Seatless Hysterium... invented by Hyrus Schnectum. A student of Sigmund Freud, he became obsessed with the idea of the "unsatisfied" female psychiatric patient and that "hysteria" was a completely curable condition if a woman was properly... "attended to". Indeed, the word hysteria originates from the Greek word for uterus, "hystera". The oldest record of hysteria dates back to 1900 B.C. when Egyptians recorded behavioral abnormalities in adult women on medical papyrus. The Egyptians attributed the behavioral disturbances to a "wandering uterus"—thus later dubbing the condition "hysteria". In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a variety of electrical devices were patented as both medical and home remedies for female disorders which a woman could use "in the privacy of her toilette"... but it was Schnectum who came up with this dual purpose excercise/sexercize "Seatless Hysterium". Suffice it to say, there was no seat, ok?... I guess we can let the smile on Mrs. Gladys Hobkins tell us everything we need to know. Schnectum's slogan for the Seatless Hysterium?... "Pedal! Pedal! Pedal your way to PLACID!!"...

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Inadvertent Inventions and Their Inventors... Henny Hiebel"...

Little known fact… In 1921, Austrian actress Henny Hiebel, after years of failed attempts to break into the big time, and a string of unsuccessful plays, failed silent films, trained dog acts, vaudeville magic shows, hootchy-kootch parlors, and burlesque skits finally gave up and joined the carnival circuit as a gypsy fortune teller with “her magic metaphysical turban”... It was on a hot August night during a break in her shift that she accidentally set fire to her turban while making some popcorn in her tent… her descendants to this day continue to make millions of dollars off her Jiffy-Pop patent… and keep her ashes in an aluminum foil bubble-urn…

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Tales From Christmases Past"... Little Bethena Wilkers...

Little Bethena Wilkers!... she had always been at odds with other little girls in the Sister Stephanata Bryerly School that she attended. Instead of classes in cooking, sewing, and home-making, she preferred mathematics, geo-sciences, and physics.... indeed, it was only because her grades were so consistently excellent that the faculty voted unanimously to allow her to take both advanced classes in the subjects she preferred and that she be allowed (chaperoned, of course!) to go to the adjoining St. Athanaseus Boys Academy for them since most of these subjects were not even offered to girls at that time.... 

Bethena thrilled (in her family's case) and confounded (in the boys' case) with her academic brilliance. She completed trigonometry, algebra, geometry, and advanced calculus all by the time she was 11, and she received statewide accolades at science fair competitions with her highly controversial inventions and displays... including on that one particular Christmas in 1930. 

She had decided to create, in honor of her hardworking mother, the Fully-Portable Happy Holiday Home-Maker, a device which allowed "the modern woman to create all the cheer and festivity of the Christmas Season while still maintaining a hygienic home and providing delicious and nutritious meals" as the promotional brochure stated...and it worked! It was a little itchy, especially under the arms, and the zipper placement still had to be finessed, but the blueberry muffins came out of the built-in oven/dishwasher perfectly with the lovely crusted sugar sprinkles on top and the requisite 26 blueberries in each muffin. And the refrigerating unit neither over-chilled the grapefruit juice into slush, nor under-froze the cranberry-papaya sherbet into goop.The washer/dryer/six-burner stove was inspired, and the fold-away formica counters were immaculate and didn't interfere with the vacuum or silver-polishing attachments. The placement of the appliances around the body of the wearer was still in need of some strategizing, but the Christmas lights twinkled merrily, the garlands of popcorn came out of the popper perfectly, and the ornaments remained on their hooks without dropping even when the roller-skate motor was throttled up to full speed...three miles per hour....and faster if you were doing a triple axel, triple toe loop. The one setback was when some tinsel drooped into one of the roller wheels, and little Bethena tripped and spilled the Baked Alaska onto the reviewers' table. "Flammable Foods" had been one of the strictest precautions that the exhibition managers had warned about, (especially after the demonstration about baked beans and hydrogen-filled zeppelins the year before!), but the ever-prepared Bethena saved the day, AND the Baked Alaska! Just under her Christmas star, she had concealed a fire extinguisher/water sprinkler system which not only knocked out the flames, but also provided a chilly blast of CO₂ "snow" to make everyone feel the Christmasy spirit to the max! Clever little Bethena not only received the blue ribbon in her category, "Sciences: Sweet & Savory" but also Best In Show... and a contract with the nice people over at Frigidaire.

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Sybil Bruncheon's HIT-OR-MISS HISTORIES!... "Inventions That Failed"...

This is the amazing "Emotion Wheel" first proposed by psycho-therapists Robert Plutchik and Kaitlin Robbs, to map the amazing array and range of emotional responses to stimuli in the modern world!.... Sadly, their psychological and philosophical research did not improve their OWN emotional dysfunction with colleagues or in the everyday workplace. They finally resolved to mount the wheel on a piece of cardboard, push a pin through the middle, and spin it in the morning as they left for their offices at Rockefeller University’s Advanced Psychological Studies Laboratories.

Their basic approach to their day would be left up to chance, and, being disciplined scientists, they would adhere strictly to what the wheel's choice had been for the both of them. It worked fairly well, although other scientists and their friends and family would notice a certain rigidity to their moods. It was often said the whatever their attitude was in the morning could not be altered at any point during the day no matter what the ups and downs that might come along. The good news was that if the day started cheerfully then not even the worst setbacks could shake them... a car accident after work was met with belly laughs and a jolly champagne dinner once they had gotten home from the hospital. On the other hand, the bad news was that both Plutchik and Robbs remained sullen and resentful even after they found out that they won the lottery on June 13th and only became grateful the following morning (courtesy of the wheel's random choice), though prone to excessive tears and unexplained introspection until the 15th. Month after month these strange mood swings went on and on without rhyme or reason or the public's knowledge of the cause. 

Eventually, the whole Emotion Wheel experiment came to a terrible end when accidentally, they spun for their moods separately. They had not realized that each had left the house without coordinating with the other on that fateful Tuesday in December. Robbs spun and received "Wildly Elated With Hints Of Mania", and Plutchik was given "Imploded Rage Armed With a Machete"..... well, you probably read the newspapers.....Remember? "HEADLESS CORPSE IN TOPLESS BAR!"....Robbs and his head were buried in Ronkonkoma, and Plutchik was confined to the Rikers Island Psychiatric Facility For The Mentally Whimsical......

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Sybil Bruncheon's "WONDERFUL WORLD OF TOMORROW" #108....The Walky-Wagon!!

Hello Friends! (...and I use that term loosely!) Did you know that scientists and engineers are working around the clock to improve YOUR lives in the future. One of the most important aspects of our lives is getting from one place to another...even when you really have no place to go! But why shouldn't milling about uselessly still be stylish? ...and reasonably comfortable! Our story concerns Dr. Lyman Palmer who lost both his feet in a freakish roller skating accident at Reilly's Really-Wheeley Roller Rink in Kenosha, Wisconsin. He was 6 at the time. He was fitted with a pair of multi-directional casters by his car-mechanic father, but spent the next several years immersed in envy, revenge, and the secret drinking of Ovaltine frappes spiked with Southern Comfort. By the time he was 18, despite his handicap and heartache, he had completed three doctorates at M.I.T., and was the choreographer for the cheerleading squad. He was a complete loner though, never dating, and after graduation he focused completely on the technology of transportation. Although intrigued by the new advances in ocean travel and flight, he decided his own destiny lay in moving people through the burgeoning urban landscape of modern cities! It was too dull, too expected to hop into a four-wheeled car, too banal to hail a taxi, to "pedestrian" to drive a truck! ... NO! Lyman envisioned a new and yet "retro" elegance in commuting. He combined his research on robotics, metallurgy, industrial cantilevering, and all the ballroom dancing instructional films he secretly watched in the privacy of his closet, and constructed his "Walky-Wagon"....

With his connections and educational pedigree, he easily got appointments with the top automobile makers of the time. Ford passed though, as did Packard, Nash, Chevrolet, Dodge, and Cord.... finally, in great frustration, he turned his back on the Americans and submitted his designs to Italy's luxurious Isotta Fraschini. They immediately optioned the project, acquired the patents, began the design and construction particulars, did the prototypes and fine tuning, and released the first editions of the "La Passeggiata". Unfortunately, the stock market crash devastated the company...the ensuing Depression, the rise of Fascist Italy, and the Second World War finished the "La Passeggiata" almost before its first step... only three were made; one was purchased by the Raja of Ramanjani, plated in 18kt gold and set with Burmese rubies and emeralds. The second one was sent over to Señor Chithulu Caca-Pooti, the shadowy South American tin magnate who claimed to be a direct descendant of the last Incan emperors. He purchased it to "walk" him up the paths at Machu Picchu. Tragically, some loose gravel resulted in his vehicle "tripping" near the Temple of the Smiling Leopard and plummeting to its doom...with him in it. The last "La Passeggiata" was purchased by Howard Hughes who wanted to see if it could be made for the American public either in pine...or out of old newspapers and papier-mâché. The first twenty of his versions either burst into flames... or trampled themselves to pieces.

Palmer finally turned over his own personal "La Passeggiata" to the Smithsonian with the following provisos: that it be demonstrated only once every decade, that it be kept under a plastic sofa zip-cover from Staten Island, and that it be named "Skippy". All of his requirements were implemented. The care and respect shown to this last "La Passeggiata" was the only consolation to Lyman Palmer. Driven to distraction as a child by the loss of his feet and filled with envy of all of the children around him, he had spent his life in bitterness and futile over-compensation. All his achievements academically and in the world of science and technology were empty to him. He withdrew into isolation to a hillside villa on Santorini. Shortly before his death in 1958, he revealed in his memoirs that his dream had always been to be a tap-dancer. It was discovered in 1989 during a cleaning of the Smithsonian "La Passeggiata" that it indeed had metal taps attached to all of its feet....

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