The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions

The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions
Author: Julia Suits
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 362
Release: 2011-11-01
Genre: Reference
ISBN: 1101545763

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"This stuff is more than just fancy pranks. It's Americana. Never has nonsense been taken so seriously...This book is a fascinating, appetite- whetting glimpse for the, if you'll pardon the expression, uninitiated." -David Copperfield, from the foreword At the beginning of the twentieth century, 40 percent of American men belonged to a lodge, and they were hazing their newbies with cigar- smoking camels, spankers, and even fake guillotines. Nearly all their prank devices came from the same place: catalogs published by the DeMoulin Brothers Company from 1896 to 1930. Julia Suits discovered one of these all-but-forgotten catalogs at a flea market. Its pages were full of bizarre hazing props: old-fashioned telephones that squirted water, bucking goats attached to tricycles, Victorian- looking furniture that sent electric shocks. These prank machines are the relics of mischief and daredevilry, produced for the country's original fraternity- hazing culture, and created by America's original high-tech geeks of the electric age. The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions offers a peek into twentieth-century American culture that most people have never seen. At its core are hundreds of the most inventive DeMoulin prank machines, complete with their original, quirky descriptions and eccentric line art. Alongside the catalog pages are newspaper clippings, lodge trivia, quotes, and stories that show the true side of America's original hazing culture.


The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions
Language: en
Pages: 362
Authors: Julia Suits
Categories: Reference
Type: BOOK - Published: 2011-11-01 - Publisher: Penguin

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"This stuff is more than just fancy pranks. It's Americana. Never has nonsense been taken so seriously...This book is a fascinating, appetite- whetting glimpse
The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions
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Pages: 203
Authors: Julia Suits
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Type: BOOK - Published: 2011 - Publisher:

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Weird and Wacky Inventions
Language: en
Pages: 91
Authors: Jim Murphy
Categories: Inventions
Type: BOOK - Published: 1981-01 - Publisher:

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Presents a series of drawings, with comments, of peculiar inventions, most of which were patented in the 19th century. Readers are asked to guess the purpose of
Weird Inventions
Language: en
Pages: 49
Authors: Jennifer Kaul
Categories: Juvenile Nonfiction
Type: BOOK - Published: 2020-08 - Publisher: Capstone Press

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"Humans are ingenious when it comes to meeting challenges. We invent all sorts of useful contraptions from the wheel to the can opener. But some of the things p
Wacky Inventions Throughout History
Language: en
Pages: 34
Authors: Joe Rhatigan
Categories: Juvenile Nonfiction
Type: BOOK - Published: 2019 - Publisher: Walter Foster Jr

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Have you ever heard of armpit air conditioners? Or a toilet paper hat? Wacky Inventions Throughout History describes some of the wackiest inventions that seem t