How Was Silly Putty Invented?

James Wright's Putty

• James Wright worked in a General Electric lab in New Haven, Connecticut during World War II. The government had contracted the company to develop a synthetic rubber substitute due to difficulties getting rubber from former suppliers in Asia that were then under Japanese rule. Wright and other scientists were hoping to create a material that could be used in boots and tires for the military. In 1943 Wright added boric acid to a silicone mix. He discovered that the resulting goo stretched and bounced.

Unwanted Goo

• Wright experimented with the mixture and learned that it held its gooey form even under extreme heat and cold. Within two years, Wright and General Electric shared the mixture with other scientists. None of them, nor did the government the work was initially done for, found the putty especially useful--particularly for their war-time needs. General Electric had quite a lot of the putty in its plant. It was dubbed Nutty Putty and Bouncing Putty.

Enter Hodgson

• Four years later Peter Hodgson encountered the goo. Hodgson was unemployed at the time. The former ad man was at a party where the goo was featured, and he saw the potential to market it as a toy. He borrowed about $150 and purchased the production rights to the goo.

Marketing the Goo

• Hodgson named his product "Silly Putty" and packaged it in replica eggs, which was convenient as it was near Easter. He discovered it had many properties, including the ability to pick up the ink from newsprint articles and comics. It gained other applications over the years, such as snaring lint and dog hair and even serving as a caulk (thus fulfilling Wright's original goal).

Silly Putty Everywhere

• Silly Putty went on to become a toy product that literally went out of this world. The Apollo 8 crew took some on their trip to the moon in 1968 where it was used to hold tools in place in their zero-gravity environment. Back on Earth, Binney and Smith, the makers of Crayola products, bought the rights to Silly Putty in 1977, a year after Hodgson died and new kinds of putty were produced. In 1995, a Silly Putty that changes colors when held against the warmth of a hand came out. In 2000, Silly Putty was added to the Smithsonian Institute. As of 2010, Silly Putty can be purchased in its "classic" form as well as glow-in-the dark gold to commemorate its 50 years on the market.