Did you know …
That until the 1960s, ants were made of celluloid plastic? It’s true!
Early ant-manufacturers appreciated celluloid’s durability and pleasing touch, but consumers found celluloid ants to be a choking hazard and painful to step on. Plus, the ants themselves couldn’t really do a damn thing; they were completely immobile and had no working organs.
In the early ‘60s, manufactures began experimenting with shell-and-gut-based ants. While the product was significantly more complex to make, the addition of working reproductive systems (within the queen ants, anyway) allowed the ants to be essentially self-replicating. And so ant makers went out of business, and the world ended up with soft (softish) ants that move around easily, and can only block human airways when massed in significant quantities.
Hmm. I think these innovations might have had something to do with space program spin-offs. But I’m not certain about that.
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