29 Odd Old-Timey Life Hacks
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- Опубліковано 17 тра 2022
- The historical life hacks Erin covers in this episode of The List Show might not cure your head cold or provide a palatable use for stale bread, but you'll at least have to award some points for creativity.
You'll learn about toast water and questionable laundry methods, and of course find out that people were recommending cocaine for ... something. These historical life hacks are mostly better left in the past, but we're brining a couple into the present.
In case you forgot, The List Show is a trivia-tastic, fact-filled show for curious people. Subscribe here for new Mental Floss episodes every Wednesday: / @mentalfloss
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Important to note that toast water wasn't a regular thing Victorians consumed, it was meant as kind of a last resort for feeding a person who was very ill and could only keep down fluids. Sure the Victorians were weird and ate some odd stuff, but context is vital.
The papering servant walls in newspapers was a way to reduce draughts. There's rooms where often in the attics, and there's a lot of gaps between the beams and rafters. You papering over the cracks to get some minimal insulation. (Also where the saying 'papering over the cracks' comes from).
10:16
*Sets buttery paper ablaze*
...
"I can't believe its not butter!"
I played with lawn darts all the time as a child. I survived that.
I also made creepy crawlers, used a wood burning tool, had a chemistry set and a slip n slide.
I would also frequently play on unsupervised playgrounds that had rock, asphalt or concrete as the base for swings and slides.
I got more injured on my bicycle than from any of those.
The reason lawn darts were banned was because one child did not survive that and died pretty horribly. When the father found out that his daughter’s death wasn’t even the first injury by lawn dart he was furious.
@@UniqueornBacon Letting children and and or drunks playing unsupervised with a pointy object, thrown considerably force, which is also heavy, resulting in injuries and death. Who could possibly thought about that?
And playing with them, reasonably, is perfectly safe. Remind you, that the children in the US protected from the evil lawn darts are also likely to shoot real guns on a regular basis.
And the generation before you had science kits with radioactive materials. And chemistry kits that were a lot more dangerous.
And most don't even have lasting damage from that.
Likewise. Except the lawn darts. I had Rollerblades and moon shoes.
An old lifehack for freckles that actually has some science behind it is using buttermilk on the area. Buttermilk contains lactic acid which is used today in skincare products to help exfoliate and even out skin tone.
Maybe I’m odd but I’ve always found freckled girls very attractive, I can’t explain why but I find a heavily freckled complexion beautiful
Might be something in that for the beef in face thing too…
Lactic acid also attracts mosquitoes.
Why would anyone want to get rid of their freckles?
My parents still have (and regularly use) a set of lawn darts, but I think the greatest risk to our health growing up were those thin plastic magic carpet toboggans. Flying down a snowy hillside into the forest at 200kph on one of those things & feeling every bump, twist, and turn jar your entire body has probably knocked years off my life!
I always enjoy watching these. You're great Erin! Keep it up!
"It's toast water", is going to be my catch-phase from now on.
“Secret of a Ladies Toilet” is the name of my IBS themed autobiography.
"Here's to water!"
...
"Wait...that's NOT what it means?"
Wow this was one of the most entertaining lists in recent memories. What insane ideas they had.
Toast water isn't anti-waste hack, it's a convalescence food. It's a way to get starch calories into you without unpleasant texture. Yes, it's a cheap remedy. But it's purpose was hydration for the ill.
As a kid I played with Jarts/lawn darts. I was visiting my Paternal Grandmother over the summer and was playing lawn darts with some neighbourhood kids when I threw the dart at the hoop normally and a freak gust of wind strong enough to blow lawn furniture around hit. I was throwing into the wind and it launched the dart from halfway to the target back to me.
As I child we all heard the stories of kids playing irresponsibly and getting a lawn dart stuck in their head and brain, so I froze for a second while my friends fleed. I then thought to cover my head and crouch down to be small. I felt something bounce off my back and stood up and thought all was fine. The friend closest to me looked at me puked.
"Relax, it missed me."
One of the other kids just pointed at me, I thought maybe the dart hit something behind me. I turned around and they ran off.
I started to feel this wierd tight feeling in my back between my rib cage and hips. It seemed sore as I turned around. I expected an unexpected bruise.
What I felt when I put my hand behind me surprised me. The dart was in my back. I grabbed it and it just popped out. the strong material shirt I was wearing and my skin was unpunctured. I later asked one of my doctors about it and he said I likely had it hit in between 2 muscles, or forced a minor surface tear in the muscle and my skin and shirt kept it from penetrating but the muscle tissue had spasmed and locked onto the tip of the dart just hard enough to hold it. He also said "I won the lottery twice" because normally that would hurt allot more than it did. It is one of the incidence that makes some of my doctors think I have asymmetric pain perception.
While I didn't agree with the all out ban of lawn darts, as while they were marketed at kids, mostly older teens and adults played with them, and I can't see how they aren't more dangerous than flinging horseshoes around, I have seen one slightly overthrown hit a tree and end up punching a hole in an old truck fender, I can see why people would in the heat of the moment do it for reasonable reasons.
By the way the kid who got sick at seeing it had siblings that turned it into an exercise in making him throw up again and again over the next 2 days so it was far more traumatizing for him than it was for me.
Never thought I’d hear the words “toast” and “water” in the same sentence 😂
I love these types of videos! It's a miracle any of them made it out alive!
"Toast Water: Why let other countries make fun of British cuisine, when we can do it ourselves!" -The British
I used to play with little toy guns that had flint and an abrasive wheel that spun when you pulled the trigger. I would create a bunch of sparks when you played with it.
As a kid we survived lawn darts. But they were very dangerous. I miss John Green But Erin is my new favorite . even though my last name is Dodd. I prefer her episodes over everyone
i remember in school science class, they put a drop of mercury on the desk and in our hands and we rolled it around and played with and studied it! if only they knew then
Watching videos like this about the past, I'm always reminded of the term "the good old days". They never existed. Lol.
I always wanted Aqua Dots as a kid, they were little plastic dots you could spray with water and they'd stick together, they were always on tv. Turns out, if someone swallowed even one of the dots, the chemical they were covered in could cause seizures and a coma. Not great for a children's toy made of colourful candy-like pieces.
I am holding on to a couple old fashioned rubber inflated dodgeballs in hopes that they become the next collectible banned toy.
8:14 "Well, once when he had diamonds replaced in his eyes He couldn't see so well, but ooh, how they shined"
I adored any toy that could make sparks as a kid, and owned several sparking toys. They were all the mid-ninety's sorts that just made sparks inside a little plastic housing, but I think those are still frowned upon today.
I loved playing with lawn darts growing up. We would break them out every time we went to my uncle’s house on the 4th of July.
I had a toy electric iron that you actually plugged into the electrical socket. It was teal with a pink handle. That thing got hot too!
I’m an Erin fan !! 🙌🏻
1970s had clackers quite notorious also dip a flower which was certainly something toxic
Erin the hero the people need.
killer toys: We were a bit disappointed when my grandma got rid of the old lawn darts
1st one is how you make kvass or gira - a very popular drink in north east europe. only it's usually dark rye bread. you soak bread in warm water for few hours, strain it, add sugar and yeast, some dried fruit - usually raisins. wait again for few hours and that's it. served cold. some people add caraway and dried apples during soaking. some add fresh lemon.
Be sure to add clackers to your list of toys
Roller Racers were a very fun yet dangerous toy.
You should have a warning on this one if you're eating dinner while watching !! KIDDDING - but the earwax for chapped lips almost knocked me out!
My killer toy: The Infamous Lawn Darts!
I played with Jarts and those Klackers. I lived to tell about it, but I don't recall any accidents.
My boomer dad let me play with his childhood carbide cannon. Used as directed, it just makes a splendid BANG. But if you jam something in the end, then, the toy cannon started acting quite a bit like a...canonical cannon.
My neighbor had a set of lawn-darts. I still remember being WAY too young to see an X-Ray of a dart piercing through a child's skull on 60-Minutes or some similar news magazine program.
My family had a toy wind-up Godzilla that would emit sparks from its mouth, which may have been what you want, and sometimes we would get a tube of SuperElasticBubblePlastic, which might also count. Can't say for sure.
I do remember having the SuperElasticBubblePlastic myself.
It smelled awful, but I played with it all day. It came with a small plastic tube to blow a glob on the end into a bubble. Inhaling the fumes of that stuff--ugh. I don't recall playing with it a second time but not because of the noxious odor. I think I let my tube get dried out or something. I had some fun with it that one day back in the '60's.
I'm not sure if a Red Rider BB gun actually killed anyone, but it'll certainly shoot your eye out ;)
I miss John Green
Toast water sounds like a lazy version of kvass
I once put a painting in full sun to rid it of smoke smell. The only thing that worked...and no damage.
I had the old "toy" make it and bake it I think it was called. Where you made sun catchers by melting plastic beads in a metal frame (like an easy bake oven).
I played with lawn darts as a kid.
Glad to know bat guano-level life hacks aren't a new phenomena.
1:52 You've shown the page. Where did it say how to use it?
When I was a kid in the UK back in the 50s-60s we'd use dry white bread [no crusts] to erase pencil marks from paper. it worked; maybe wouldn't work so well with the pencils or the quality of paper today. It made a lot of crumbs, though.
[] We also had a copy of "Enquire Within" - that was its full title to us! no idea when that edition was published, but it lasted years.
*Stale bread can be toasted or grilled if it's sliced bread. Rolls, buns and biscuits can be lightly steamed and brought back to being fresh. Stale bread would keep for a long time due to lack of moisture just like beef jerky. This dried, stale bread was called hardtack and was a staple for 100's of years. Old bread was also used to ferment beer and Apple Jack Wine.*
*The leaves of a Beech tree are marcscence, meaning they dry up in winter but mostly remain on the tree. To collect the leaves one must pick, or harvest them from the tree. Milk that has turned or soured is still safe to cook with as long as the internal temperature reaches 160 degrees. Buttermilk is milk that has "turned" and famous for biscuits and pancakes.*
*Planting root crops by the New Moon or dark of the moon. Potatoes have eyes and must be planted during the phase of no moon or the New Moon. If planted during the Full Moon phase the potato vines will still look healthy but there can be as much as a 50% reduction in the amount of potatoes harvested.*
*If you have a loose hammer handle soak the hammer head in a hot 50/50 solution of lard and water. The wood will draw the water and oil mixture into its fibers causing the wood to swell against the hammer head becoming tight once again. While water alone will work the addition of the oil keeps the wood swollen longer because it doesn't evaporate like water does.*
*Placing five pennies under just planted tomato or squash plants will prevent blossom end rot and some types of blight. However the pennies must be the copper pennies minted before 1982 and not the zinc pennies minted afterwards.*
*When planting a tree or bush place a couple large stones in the bottom of the hole before planting. The tree will be able to absorb some minerals from the rocks but the most benefit is the rocks help draw moisture in the ground and will help keep the roots moist during dry spells.*
*When growing vegetables in areas where water is scarce you always plant the "THREE SISTERS" together. The three sisters are corn, beans, and squash. The corn stalk grows tall giving the beans or peas a structure to grow up and the big leaves of the squash shade the ground around the roots cooling the soil and reducing water evaporation.*
I had several wood burning sets as a kid and scars from each of them!
1:08 I only know the version where then the whole thing is left to ferment. … One way to get drunk.
killer toys? chemistry sets. I think every one of us who had one of those in the 1970s and earlier did the thing where we mixed everything together in one container with no idea what we were doing or what would happen. When I tried it, I just got a brown goop that I threw away.
Love from Mexico Mental Team
Amo México! (Aunque mi español es basura jaja). Donde ésta en el país?
@@MentalFloss Disfrutando desde Guadalajara, Jalisco!!. tu muy bien, Saludo especial a Erin !!
I wonder how dangerous those chemical sets we played with as kids (1970’s) were.
In some cases, pretty dangerous! In research, we already came across an "atomic laboratory kit" from the 70s that included uranium.
@@MentalFloss whoopsie
@@jokeal3613 Hahah yes, that one is ok to laugh about, as I don't know of any radiation poisonings that were tied to it. Some of the other things we're reading about are pretty gnarly, though-not as fun as we thought it might be when we cooked up the idea.
Couldn't have been any more dangerous than the ones I had in the '50s. Yeah, I nearly blew up the garage. Place smelled like sulfur for months! Good thing the garage was way in the back of the yard, not attached like these days.
The chemistry set my parents got me had two containers of cyanide: sodium and potassium. Good thing I wasn’t interested in homicide back then!
*Melted butter on popcorn makes it taste better. Melted margarine on popcorn turns it into a soggy, nasty mush.*
Butter is better. Hail butter!
@@crystaljones1935 *Hail Yeah!*
Lawn Darts; cause who wouldn't want to throw a steel arrow shaped projectile into the air to land wherever it may fancy.
Lawn darts, lol, though we didn't have them long. I think my folks figured out they weren't a good thing. Also "Clackers". those heavy marbles on a string that you swung up sown trying to hit them together. Another tow that didn't take long to figure out it was painful!
The worst thing with clackers was when they hit together - and shattered.
Well, there used to be an old science kit they sold to kids which actually had some radioactive materials in it. Fun stuff. (They have one at a museum near by house)
The Gilbert U 238 Atomic energy lab? Still baffles me that that was made into a kids toy, even in the 50s. Same company also had a glass blowing kit in the 30s
Deadly toys? How about lawn darts?
A couple of questions. Why would someone want to rid themselves of freckles? Freckles are often quite pretty to look at, in my opinion anyway. As for the toast water.. If you have old bread.. and toast it anyway for the toast water.. why not eat it as toast? Old bread is perfect for toast.
Most dangerous toys? Chuckie. Definitely Chuckie.
We had those sticky bead toy things that made kids really sick. I forget if they actually killed anyone, but yeah my parents threw those away pretty quick. We were finding those beads all over the house for months.
Make bread and butter pudding! look it up I have loved it since I first had it as a kid.
Stale white bread cut into smaller squares heat in milk. Serve for porridge. Eat with some Sugar.
Bread water is called Kvass and it's very popular in Belarusian, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, and Xinjiang cuisine.
My sister had the CSI crime kit that was recalled for having dangerous chemicals in the glow in the dark fingerprint dusting powder
that poor duck
Think I prefer bread pudding and French toast. Toast water is wrong.
#19 is still done today in some parts of the south.
What does milk do to "Clean" a floor? If skim works the best, it sounds like your using watery protein shake.
I can't think of many particularly dangerous toys I survived, but our activities were bad enough; tree swings created out of any scrap of rope someone found, attached to a tree branch, and tied a stick to the bottom as a seat. Bonus points if it was over a steep drop! Building ramps for our bikes out of scavenged wood and old milk crates; saw a kid lose his front teeth after not getting up enough speed and faceplanting his handlebars. You know, just the general life of a feral millennial kid.
As far as deadly toys - I greatly enjoyed our Honda ATC 125M - a three wheeled all terrain vehicle that Honda dealers could sell to off-roaders and farmers year-round (unlike motorcycles or snowmobiles).
Growing liability risk from thousands of injured kids (broken arms, legs, and even deaths) led manufacturers to sign a Consent Decree with the Consumer Products Safety Commission in 1987, after which they were withdrawn from sale in the US.
Why make toast water when you could make french toast?
As Simon likes to say….. the past was the worst.
So..the earwax... would it work?
0:51 Rofl
Cocaine's a helluva drug
I find freckles attractive
These "life hacks" are more about making sure you don't live a long life, eh.
Toast water . . .
Gavin Free's nightmare.
Meh. I prefer to use earl grey tea for sunburn. Soothes the burn, speeds healing, plus... it just smells nice. I have this lovely earl grey with lavender. It's good for sunburn and delicious iced.
A WAAAAAAAY too much chemistry set. :/ I swear to this day I don't think mine was meant for children....
Yeah.... I'm not going to try it... But I'm sure it taste similar to drinking water while eating bread.
Wouldn't toast water kinda taste like watered down beer?
You missing lot of steps. And hops.
The ghost of beer
How is hydrochloric acid a life hack for anything? Do people just have it sitting around?
Was really hoping this was going to be john green
On history chanel she was more beauty
Please, please, please stop using "Old-Timey".