You use them every day without a second thought. They sit in your kitchen, your bathroom, your closet. But dig into the history of some of the most common objects in your life, and you will find origin stories darker than anything you would expect from a bottle of mouthwash or a pair of shoes.
Treadmills Were Literally Designed as Prison Torture Devices
In 1818, British engineer Sir William Cubitt invented the treadmill as a punishment device for prisoners. Inmates at Brixton Prison and others across England were forced to walk on giant paddle-wheel treadmills for up to 10 hours a day, climbing the equivalent of 7,000 to 14,000 feet. The energy generated was sometimes used to grind grain, hence the name, but often the machines were connected to nothing at all. The point was not productivity. It was suffering.
The prison treadmill was used throughout the 19th century and was not banned in British prisons until 1898. The modern fitness treadmill did not appear until the 1950s, and its inventors probably hoped you would never look up what the machine was originally built to do.
Were Chainsaws Really Invented for Surgery?
Yes. In the 1780s, two Scottish doctors, John Aitken and James Jeffray, developed a prototype of the chainsaw for use in symphysiotomy, a procedure that involved cutting through the pelvic bone to widen the birth canal during difficult childbirths. The original device was small, hand-cranked, and looked nothing like the tree-felling machines we know today.
The tool was later adapted for cutting bone in amputations before anesthetic was widely available. It was not until the early 20th century that the chainsaw was scaled up and adapted for forestry use. Every time you see a lumberjack in a flannel shirt, remember that their primary tool started in an operating room.
Listerine Was a Floor Cleaner Before It Was a Mouthwash
Listerine was invented in 1879 by Dr. Joseph Lawrence as a surgical antiseptic. It was named after Joseph Lister, the pioneer of antiseptic surgery. Before it landed on your bathroom shelf, it was marketed as a floor cleaner, a treatment for gonorrhea, and a cure for dandruff. In 1914, it became the first antiseptic to be sold over the counter as a mouthwash.
The genius marketing move that made Listerine a household name was inventing a problem. In the 1920s, the company popularized the medical term halitosis, which simply means bad breath, and ran ads suggesting that people with halitosis were destined for social rejection. Sales went from $115,000 to over $8 million in seven years.
Graham Crackers Were Created to Suppress Human Desires
Reverend Sylvester Graham was a 19th-century Presbyterian minister who believed that a bland diet could curb what he considered sinful urges. In 1829, he developed the graham cracker as part of a dietary regimen designed to reduce excitement and promote moral purity. He also advocated against white bread, alcohol, and anything with flavor that might stimulate the body.
Graham’s followers, known as Grahamites, adhered to a strict lifestyle that included cold showers, hard mattresses, and meals consisting mainly of his bland crackers and water. The modern graham cracker, sweetened with honey and sugar, would have horrified him.
Coca-Cola Contained Actual Cocaine Until 1903
When pharmacist John Stith Pemberton created Coca-Cola in 1886, the recipe included coca leaf extract, which contained cocaine. At the time, cocaine was widely considered a wonder drug and was available in everything from toothache drops to patent medicines. The original Coca-Cola was marketed as a brain tonic and intellectual beverage.
As public awareness of cocaine’s addictive properties grew, the Coca-Cola Company began reducing the cocaine content and removed it entirely by 1903. The formula still uses coca leaf extract today, but it is processed by the Stepan Company in New Jersey to remove all active cocaine alkaloids before it reaches the syrup plant.
Other Objects Hiding Surprisingly Dark Backstories
Bubble wrap was invented in 1957 by engineers Alfred Fielding and Marc Chavannes, who were trying to create textured wallpaper by sealing two shower curtains together. The wallpaper was a commercial failure, but the material found its true calling as packaging material three years later when IBM began using it to ship computers.
Play-Doh was originally a wallpaper cleaner. Noah McVicker created it in the 1930s to roll over wallpaper and remove soot stains from coal heating. When vinyl wallpaper replaced traditional paper and coal heating declined, the product was headed for extinction until McVicker’s sister-in-law, a nursery school teacher, began using it as modeling clay for her students.
Ketchup was once sold as medicine. In the 1830s, Dr. John Cook Bennett marketed tomato-based pills as a cure for diarrhea, jaundice, and indigestion. The pills were eventually debunked as quackery, but the tomato condiment survived and evolved into the Heinz empire. High heels were originally designed for Persian horse riders in the 10th century to help their feet stay in stirrups. King Louis XIV of France later adopted them as a status symbol.
The mundane objects we take for granted carry histories of punishment, quackery, marketing manipulation, and accidental invention. The next time you step on a treadmill, squeeze some ketchup, or lace up a pair of heels, know that you are participating in a story far stranger than you ever imagined.
Which dark origin story shocked you the most? Tell us in the comments and share this with someone who loves weird history.