Overlooked inventions

I’m excited to present to my audience a brand new segment for this blog: overlooked inventions!

We haven’t had a new segment since “That’s technology!” back in 2007, when I discovered that some cameras can detect smiles.

This segment is for normal, everyday items that we take for granted. Such as… a box of tissues!

Inside the box shown in the photograph is a stack of tissues. One is poking vertically up through an opening. If one pulls that tissue out, another one miraculously stands up. It’s very convenient.

Imagine if this invention didn’t exist. Your mucus-laden fingers would clutch at a loose stack of tissues. Several would come off the stack at once. A couple would fall to the dirty floor, never to be used. You would push the ones that didn’t fall against your nose only to find that they are already wet. It would be frustrating and wasteful.

Some people say that this invention prevents 20 billion tissues from going into the landfill per year in Canada alone.

Apparently the pop-up tissue box came about in the 1920s. To whoever invented it: we are in your debt.