The same minds that landed a man on the moon and brought him back safely on little more computing power than a slide rule.
The same minds that won the Cold War and brought down the Berlin Wall.
Descendents of the same minds that won WWI & WWII.
Ok, now the thread can be hijacked to bitch about the Baby Boomer Generation. lol
I just thought of another evil genius invention. Jr High I walk into the library and an epic spitball fight is underway. Creative genius Kevin And Jim pull out the big guns.
They had taken the typical clear plastic bic pen, removed the inside so its now just a hollow shell and taped up the little hole (remember that hole?).
They then cut a metal hanger up so that its a small ramrod like piece. You put a spitball into the bic tube, force it down towards the end using your ramrod. You then take another spitball and push it into the front tube section and leave it.
Now, when you ram your metal ramrod into the tube, the force and pressure from the first spitball makes the spitball at the end explode out of your bic spitball gun and you will win the war. Amazing how loud and powerful that device was.
You wrote a wonderful post.
As I was reading through this thread, what I noticed was all the high-level creativity and innovation that went on with kids during the 60s and 70s. This is what kids did then, played creatively - and yes, some of it was very dangerous, and yes, it is what took us to the moon and back.
It started with a bunch of creative kids with time on their hands, freedom and supplies that could be bought freely at that time.
My dad did a lot of those bottle rocket/rocketry/chemistry type things when he was a kid - said they mixed up things and experimented, the old trial and error, blew things up, put things on the train tracks and then studied what happened after the train ran over them (nothing live, LOL) -all at a very young age - he later became a physicist and worked in the space industry.
Dad always said it was those who thought outside the box, who did things that people said “couldn’t be done” who took us into space. A lot of them were the sons of coal miners, farmers, working men, etc. Guys like my dad who came from dirt-poor families that tended the cornfields of Indiana.
Looks like it starts at a very young age, and may it never,ever be lost.