April 1, 2025 • 62 mins
Pretty much everyone in the developed world is familiar with vending machines these days -- you see them in all sorts of places, selling all sorts of things. But where did they come from? What's the weirdest stuff sold via vending machine? In today's episode, Ben, Noel and Max explore the surprisingly ancient concept of automated product dispensers.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
for tuning in. Let's hear it for the Man, the
myth Legend, our super producer, mister Max Williams, the top.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Remember how I started saying Zan's a bargain.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
We all just went with it. I think I stole
hisah from Lauren Vogelbam Actual facts, Lauren Actual Facts, Vogel
bumb love it.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I mean, I think we should bring Zan's bar back
to be like Kahokia.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
I sometimes said via text, say hazoo exclamation.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Uh, well, we're going to put a quarter in our
local podcast vending machine and that's a that's ridiculous history,
and hopefully our snack doesn't get stuck and we have
to shake that thing because that's part of the history
of vending machines and hopefully we're talking about today we're
only touching a vending machine for snacks as we are
(01:27):
going to learn. Uh, vending machines vend a lot of things,
ridiculous stuff.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're Noel Brown. I'm I'm Ben Bolling. Uh.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
I think before we teamed up with our research associate
Jeff Bartlett, Uh, we were all kind of curious about
where vending machines come from because nowadays they're ubiquitous and noel.
You know, if I'm in Japan, there there are ountless
(02:00):
vending machines. If if you and I are walking through
let's say, what's.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
That the airport. The airport, they have been the machines
for everything at the airport, snacks like you know, sandwiches,
high value, Yes, exactly, and good.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
I think it's a good thing that there are cottoms
in vending machines, you know, in the.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Airport, especially when you want to join the Mile High Club,
which is actually be safe about it.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Yeah, actually the Mile High Club has Uh it sounds
cooler than it is. We are a PG thirteen show
cool secrets.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
I mean, plane bathrooms are awful just to use, They're awful.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
They're so small, they flushed so aggressively, like it gives
me a start every time, like oh, it's like I
feel like I'm gonna get sucked out of the planes
in that little hole.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
It's the pause too, because you hit the flush button
and then there's like two or three seconds before it
just evacuates.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
Yeah, it has to be that a cross stuff though,
because shoots it shoots it out over over the over
the out into the air instantly, you know it is.
I didn't think so no longer true good, although I did.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
See a meme I guess notly meme with more of
an Internet video of cruise ships just straight up mass
dumping waste into the ocean and it's legal as long
as there are a certain distance offshore.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
They have Matthews Surbus right.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
On the on the water taxi in Chicago. Oh, never forget,
never forget, never forget.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Also, U cruise ships are one of the few things
that are currently not sold in a vending machine, and
that's probably just due to the size of the cruise ship.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
This is very true, but I would argue or pose
it that there are vending machines on many cruise ships.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
I know, and I want a vending machine that sells
vending machines, you know what I mean, wake up car.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
But that is a pretty awesome art installation. Idea is
a vending machine that sells tiny replicas of vending machines
with different stuff in them, so you can get like
the snack vending machine and then collect them all like Pokemon.
I'll be honest.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Sorry, I'm not meaning to take its even further off,
but it reminds me of that season one Rick and
Morty episode where they're jumping through universes.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
You know, it's not that one's.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
The uh, it's actually the one where we first meet
Evil Morri. Spoilers this first season though, But it's like
it's a rotation of four things. It's humans, pizza, phone,
and chairs. So in one universe is like a chair
talking into a human ordering, uh, sitting out a pizza ordering.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
It's hard to redo them all.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
It's all it's all for iterations of those right, and
we see there this What was I gonna say? Oh,
I was gonna mention this. We have to at the
top a few A little while back, I can't remember
how long ago, Noel, you and our pal Matt, Frederick
and a couple of other folks visited Miao Wolf. You know,
(05:14):
we all went together and they had they had Mega
mart yes, Mega mar oh Mega Bart and they had
a very interesting spin on vending machines.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Psycho telling waves. Yeah, yeah, and.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
What I think we're all surprised to learn is that
vending machines are.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Actually pretty old.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Our story begins with a guy named Hero or Heroon
or Heron of Alexandria uh in ancient Egypt. This guy
purportedly invented the first vending machine and it was not
It was not selling snacks, so it was not selling
cruise ships or condoms. It was selling holy water, of course.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Because you know, for when you need some in a pinch.
This is a smart fellow. He's a mathematician, an engineer,
and obviously an inventor. He, among many other incredible innovations
that still kind of remain very very relevant today, invented
the windwheel, which is, you know, obviously kind of a
(06:27):
certainly something that's been developed to generate hydro electric power
and wind power, et cetera. He published some very detailed
schematics of a device called the a low pile also
known as Heroes enginem.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Yeah, and that was a that was like a steam
powered mechanism. Some of his ideas clearly come from earlier
Greek inventors and mathematicians. And when we whenever we talked
about Hero of Alexandria, we have to acknowledge that a
lot of his original stuff has been lost to time.
(07:08):
It makes me wonder whether our pal Ben Thompson from
Badass of the Week has covered hero like imagine being
so cool that your name becomes a noun or a
descriptor for other cool people.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Is that is that true? Is this the hero that
that is referencing?
Speaker 1 (07:29):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I always assume, Okay, Maybeeah. You certainly was scientifically and
innovatively heroic. And if you want to dig in a
little beyond the scope of what we're going to talk
about today to his life, you can check out a
great profile on the Famous people dot com Hero of Alexandria.
You can just search for it. There. Really great site
(07:50):
and great resource.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
I'm looking it up. A hero comes from a Greek
word that means protector or defender, and it later gets
adapted into Latin.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Yeah, I don't know, you.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Know what, would he have just been named hero as
like like before or after hero became a byword for
being awesome.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
It's a good question, Ben, But of his many innovations,
he was very much responsible for the kind of proto
vending machine and it certainly didn't involve all of the
same electronics. And you know ability to use different types
of payment, you know, the thing you can slide the
dollar into and have it spit back out at you
over and over and over again. But it did accept
(08:39):
a coin. This thing very much was way ahead of
its time.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Yeah, let's put on our house stuff works hats and
get a little deeper here. The coin would be inserted
into a slot. From there it would fall onto a pan.
The pan is connected to a lever. The lever opens
a valve through which holy water flows out, and the
(09:05):
pan keeps moving under the weight of the coin until
eventually the coin slides off. We know that there wasn't
really any kind of like governmental oversight on ensuring this
was holy water exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
The quality control there.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
Right, they didn't really have QA at that level. But
the the mechanics make sense, right, and these have to
be coins of a certain weight to operate the mechanism.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Well, I mean, I would imagine that coins back then
would have been pretty beefy.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
I imagine so as well. You know, it's also a
way a clever way of finding counterfeit coins, possibly the lever.
After the coin slides off the pan, the lever raises
back to its normal starting state. Which closes the valve
which stops the flow of water. Now, hero or Heron
(10:03):
or Heroon as he's sometimes called, did not describe this
as a vending machine, and he didn't say, you know,
this is going to be an awesome way to sell
Nestley crunch bars in the future. He said, this is
a sacrificial vessel. And the entire reason this first vending
(10:25):
machine exists is not to make it easy for people
to buy stuff. It is to limit the amount of
holy water people can use at an ancient temple.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Like they want to limit the supply, you reduce the
circulations and ultimate control over holiness.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Yeah, kind of like if you're in a if you're
in a public restroom and there's you know, there's a
specific timer on the hand dryer, right or the air dryer.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Oh sure, Or in Europe, and I'm sure in Japan
in any other countries, a lot of public restrooms are
pay and that money is used, I would imagine to
help the upkeep of the facility, and consequently those bathrooms
are some of the cleanest I've ever encountered. I think
when you have a little bit of a literal buy in,
(11:16):
it might make you behave a little better.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
You know, Yes, there is definitely some there's definitely some
psychology at play there. For the pay to I almost
have pay to play public restrooms, pay to pay right, Yes, yes,
if we fast forward to I mean fast forward quite
(11:40):
a long time, Max, give us a fast forward queue. Boom.
We're in the eighteenth century. We're in England now, Hero
of Alexandria is long gone, but the idea of vending
machines is having a moment. They are these things called
(12:03):
had you ever heard of this nole that were called
honor boxes?
Speaker 2 (12:07):
No, no, tell me about honor boxes.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
I mean they're vending machines with a fancier name.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Sounds like something you would pay your indulgences into for
the church, you know, put your money in the honor
box for absolution.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
Or like a weird Victorian euphemism. It does sound like
a glory whole kind of situation.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
I'm sorry the quiet part out loud.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Yeah, but the otter box, No, I can't get out
of it.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
That's a case the honor I thought you said otter box. Oh,
the otter box is a different thing. But they're pretty good,
solid cases. And we're not sponsored. Yeah, yeah, we just
used them.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
So these things were early vending machines that were operated
via coin, and they were used to sell tobacco and snow.
Uh snuff for anybody not born in the in the
seventeen hundreds. Uh snuff is a thing where like every
(13:10):
time you see someone in a film take out a
small container and then sniff it really quickly if it's.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Either snuff cocaine there there. But yeah, right right in
Victorian times, I mean people would literally dab dab dab
the snuff onto their hand and like take a rip
of it, you know. I mean it's wild. It's such
finely ground tobacco that you would sniff. It seems so
gross to me. I mean it's wild that people would
(13:40):
seems like their nasal passages would get real funky, real quick.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Yeah, you know, we're not a judgmental group here. A
ridiculous thing too, by the way, I think people really
I would.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
Think, but we are curious it does exist. Yeah, snuff
is still a thing. You can. It's it's sort of
like old timey, but it's considered smokeless tobacco. Finely ground
or pulverized leaves its snorted or sniffed into the nasal cavity,
and that is still done today by a certain type
I imagine. Okay, yes, fancy do they wear white gloves
(14:15):
while they do it? It just seems like so victorian to me, right,
you know, do they have to wear a peruke?
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Can you use snuff while you're not wearing you know,
men's leggings or stockings. Look, we're not a judgmental group,
but we are curious.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
So if you are, If you.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
Are, or if you know someone who engages with snuff,
just tell us about it on our Facebook group Ridiculous
Historians anyway. Look, so, yes, the first vending machine probably
holy Water. The next boom of vending machines probably tobacco, and.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
Far a walk okay, walk us through it.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
I can't far so all right, these these things are
these honor boxes are portable brass mechanisms, contraptions really, and
they are a huge boon for the tobacco industry overall.
(15:19):
They are our next big step in the commercialization and
the emerging ubiquity of vending machines as a concept kind.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Of makes sense if you think about it, because if
you maybe it's an age thing. But in my mind,
one of the classic styles of vending machines that you
see less and less of these days is the cigarette
machine with the big old clunky, you know, slot machine
type pull things. You know, it makes a really good
chunk sound. And you still will see them at bars
(15:50):
and taverns. And there are more modern ones that I've seen,
mainly in Europe, but in America, if you see them
at all, it's going to be the super old timing style,
one which which had to have evolved, you know, from
these honor boxes some way.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
One hundred percent. Yeah, and there, you know, now that
I'm thinking about it, those are so old school. I
remember a lot of them were actually old because yeah, yeah,
I remember one of my relatives told me years back
now that that was the way to know you were
in a bad place.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Told me that's a little broad, but okay, glad they
were looking out for you. If you see one.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Of those machines, right, yeah, you're in a place you
shouldn't be.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
You're in grave danger. Right.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
It was a little intense, but I'm sure the those
intense intentions were noble. In the nineteenth century, the eighteen hundreds,
we see the introduction of stamp and newspaper vending machines.
And do you guys remember back when people.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Were their old school thing? You don't see it. Well,
you just sort of see those newspaper boxes every now
and the end, not nearly as much as you used to.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
No, no, back, I was gonna say, do you remember
when people read newspapers?
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Yeah, it's quaint almost these days. And as we know,
a lot of those legacy newspapers are certainly struggling with
that with the circulation of their physical print copies, and
they really rely a lot on like spoke subscriptions for
the people that actually want a real paper to hold,
you know, and the Sunday Times and all of that
good stuff.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Tell us a little bit about Richard Carlyle.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
He was the one responsible for these newspaper boxes in
eighteen twenty two. He actually came up with these in
order to do a little, i don't know, work around
to avoid censorship by distributing the papers through automated means. Yeah,
(17:53):
and this is this is huge.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
We're seeing a resurgence of things like this through some
local innition. Here in Atlanta, Georgia, where we record this podcast,
there are these like everybody has a little free library now.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Talking about the little little boxes, the.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Little banded, little band book libraries.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Oh well, yeah, there's certainly that. There's that's that's awesome.
I love.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Yeah, those are repurposed old newspaper vending machines.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
Aha, So I don't think I've seen those, but I
have certainly seen in lots of different cities those kind
of little mailbox style like leave a book, take a
book kind of boxes. Free libraries for sure. Yeah, exactly,
that's exactly what you're talking about, Ben, But he is
doing this because he's able to kind of sort of
skirt the authorities by distributing banned materials through these boxes.
(18:47):
Simon Denham was another innovator who's responsible for creating a
stamp dispensing machine. In eighteen sixty seven, he patented it
and that was kind of the next step of vending evolution.
It represented the first fully automatic vending machine. Uh. And
this it just kind of just you know, snowballed from there. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Yeah, this is cool because already we're learning so much
more about vending machines. So just a recap, we've got
holy water, the limiting of holy water, not selling it,
just like keeping people from using all of it at once.
Then we've got tobacco and snuff, which I still think
(19:28):
mystifies both of us. And then but right, and then
we have fighting against censorship, and then we have people
selling stamps. So naturally, you know, it would make sense
that the rest of the world looked around and said,
what else can we put in these machines?
Speaker 2 (19:48):
Anything? Sky's the limit, and it truly was the limit.
In eighteen eighty three, a guy named Perceval ever it
was the first to truly innovate some of these previous
kind of iteration the vending machine into a form much
more resembling what we know today as modern vending machines
and these dispense postcards. So this would be that kind
(20:09):
of this the curly queue kind of design. Right, Okay,
you have a thing and then a little curly cue,
and then another thing, and then that's another thing with
a quirkscrew, and the mechanism turns and causes the thing
in the front to drop, you know, out of the
front of the thing into a trough that you can
then reach down and grab it.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
That's cool, yeah, yeah, yeah. And this is a kind
of old school vending machine approach that I personally associate
with with auto repair shops weirdly enough, because you go
into the waiting room and then there you go.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Or oil change places.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Yeah yeah, oil change places as well, and they'll have
the vending machine, you know, with the elderly cheese its
and the vintage em and.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
M's aged if you please, aged very well.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Heaven for fends that we would ever we would ever
disparage the Noble Lines Company.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
Oh yes, jesuits.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
So all right, this this design you're describing their Percival's invention.
These vending machines are able to sell all kinds of
stationary right, envelopes, but also notepaper postcards. And as this
stuff propagates throughout train stations and post offices, we see
(21:35):
that there's something crucial in the vending machine concept here.
Its location, right. A vending machine that sells envelopes just
on insert random street corner here, that's not going to
do as well as a machine that sells envelopes at
(21:55):
the literal post office.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
It's not.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
You know, if you're at a railway station and you
want to send a postcard to friends or family, that's
where a vending machine comes in, right.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
Yeah, Or if you're at the train station waiting for
a train. It's a perfect place to have a little
snacky machine, which is what we start to see in
the UK with the establishment of I love the term.
I mean to say, by the way, so the sweet
Meat Automatic Delivery Company in eighteen eighty seven sweet meat
of course, or maybe you don't know, it refers to
(22:30):
like a treat. You know, a piece of candy is
a sweet meat. You hear him say, I Monty Python.
Sometimes it's funny you say that.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
I was just watching some excellent money Python interviews last night.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Yeah, let's say they're the best some of my fa
I mean the Flying Circus. There's still sketches that I
come across that I haven't seen. And it's like the
British equivalent of kids in the Hall, kind of like
the Flying Circus is phenomenal if anyone hasn't Some people
don't even know it exists, Like they know the movies
and stuff, but they don't know there's a good the
Parrot sketch, The Parrots Sketch. I guess maybe that's true. Yes,
(23:14):
I'm saying a lot of people don't maybe realize how
deep a catalog it is. Oh yeah, and what a
wealth of treasures there is to find. Yes, yeah, agreed.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
I would love to see a muddy python sketch about
a vending machine.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Or there's one. The one I remember learning sweetmeats from
was there's a sketch about this company that's like debuting
this new box of chocolates, and each one of them
is more unpleasant than the next. And the yeah, it
is called crunchy frog, and it's crunchy because it's got
the bones in it still. And like there's another one
where like it's like you you take a bite of
(23:50):
it and it shoots steel bolts out into your cheeks, yes,
and cheeks from the inside, and they call it a
sweet meat.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
I remember this because you can tell that the pythons
got together and sometimes they just wrote a list of
phrases or a riff on an idea, and then they
built a sketch around it. What I was gonna say is,
we could do a pretty cool sketch about vending machines.
We just need accounting to pay for a vending machine,
(24:17):
and we'll do it, you know, because we are people
in the United States, and American ingenuity really comes into
the foreground in the late eighteen hundreds. Thanks to the
Thomas Adams Gum Company. These guys make gum vending machines
in eighteen eighty.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Eight, yep, and they were really popular in New York
City on you guessed it train platforms. And this truly
set off the I guess We've said this multiple times,
like and this is the one that set off the
vending machine craze, but no, this really did it. The
Pulver Manufacturing Company added a little fun twist to these
gum vending machines by including little toys and little figurines
(25:02):
like based, I don't know how much action you were
going to get. I'm picturing like those really sad wrestling
figures that like you're just tiny, and the way of
it all with.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
No points of articulation. Yeah, but this is still cool as.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
This is entertainment is what it became, you know, not
just crucial everyday items. Now it's like the sky's the
limit truly. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Yeah, what I was going to say is this is
straight seahorse teeth, you know, it's it's never one of
vending machine that sells seahorse teeth. Yeah, and hot cheese.
So we we see this this idea again, like we've
been continually returning to this concept that one could indeed
(25:47):
sell anything, limited only by the size of the thing
being sold and the the finances of the potential customer.
If we go to eighteen ninety three, just a few
years later, we'll see a German chocolate manufacturer with the
name I absolutely adore stover Stoverk sold their chocolate in
(26:13):
vending machines. They also sold, of course, chewing gum, cigarettes, matches,
and soap. I feel like someone in the executive room
or someone in the boardroom at Stolverk made this machine
up for them.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
Sure you know, it's whatever it takes. I mean, if
you think about it, though, Ben, it totally makes sense
that this as a concept has been around for so long.
I mean, to me, it's like the earliest idea of
this would be literally putting something on a table and
a little you know, dish to put your money in
and trusting people to pay for the items they take. Which,
(26:51):
by the way, in I believe it's Switzerland, there are
like honor system vending machine for like cheese and stuff
and on these like hiking trails up in the up
in the Alps and Swiss Alps.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Jump in here real quick, it's not offending machine. But
one thing I find really cool in Seattle is it's
the public transit is on honor system. Basically like there
is you pay for the ticket and uh, you tap
it on. Somebody charged you for the ride, but there's
nothing stopping you. You can just walk on. And I
think the design behind it is like if somebody needs
to get somewhere, it doesn't have the money, you'd rather
(27:30):
than just walk onto the train.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
Yeah, then getting shot for like fair jumping at the
New York like that or.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
Like yeah, or like not be able to work to
make money for sure. Yeah, And so then it's just
like you know, it's for me. I'm like, I like
that and I pay for it every single time because.
Speaker 2 (27:48):
And and the proof is in the pudding as far
as like what funds are being generated and are they
able to sustain themselves. It's like a public service like
that shouldn't be operated like a profit, you know, making business.
Shout out to the post office. Post office got some problems.
I'm gonna get on my post office box again. I
(28:09):
just and I when I say it's got some problems,
it's because of funding. But and also like who buys
stamps anymore. Everyone ships things or or you know, Amazon,
I'm sure has put an absolute dent.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Part of it's a cell phone. Well, but I'm not.
I'm not gonna get the stop box.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
What do you mean by cell phone? The post office
has been sabotaged.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Yeah, there's a law those past almost two decades ago
now Ben that basically they have to backfund retirement funds
like a ridiculous amount. And what it does is just keeps.
It turned a department that had been profitable forever to
this what it is now we should do. And people
(28:50):
believe that this was intentional to get rid of.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
The post I'm one of those people. Of those people
to maybe, Ben, this is more of stuff they don't
want you to know. But this is news to me
and I'd love to find out more. But as we
roll into the twentieth century, we're going to get to
answering some of this questions that I know you all
have out there, like how does the machine know your
money is real? We'll get into that in a bit.
(29:14):
But the kind of more modern vending machine boom came
after the twenties, when up to that point in America,
at least penny candies had kind of been really the
only game in town, which you know isn't going to
make you a pile of money. But when you're selling
full priced items like food products or cigarettes a packet
(29:35):
of cigarettes, that's when the money really starts to flow,
and you'll see whole businesses selling their stock entirely through
networks of vending machines.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
Oh, before we move on, I've got to say it ridiculous.
Historians you may find this but fuddling as well as
Noel Max. I think you guys will, I think you
guys will enjoy this. Do you know what these penny
candy or hard care indie products were called.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
In the UK? Sweetmeats, boiled sweets, boiled sweets. Yeah, another
very off putting, very British.
Speaker 1 (30:09):
It's like barley water or spotted dick. What are the
other ones? Oh man, it's so strange with oak brown sauce.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
Treacle tarts. Yeah, what's going on with that? What's up?
Sounds like poo When I hear treacle, I think of
and pepe.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
I don't know why, imagine, I'm just imagining the idea
of would you like a boiled sweet?
Speaker 2 (30:35):
And so sounds like something the child catcher would say.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
Yeah, it sounds like someone should look into that anyhow. Anyhow,
we have reached a pivotal point as you described there.
Vending machine manufacturers realize that they can up their profits
by selling more sophisticated products. Right, A pack of cigarettes
(31:02):
takes more work than you know, boiled sweets or hard candy.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
So weird, it's such a weird phrase.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Anyway, So you could easily, for a time, you could
easily go to a cigarette vending machine and buy cigarettes,
even if you were too young to do so. This
is a health problem, this is also a social problem.
And the cigarette machines come before the soda machines. I
(31:33):
always imagine a Coca Cola machine or a Pepsi machine
when I think of vending machines. They didn't come around
until nineteen thirty seven.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Well, and especially since the coke vending machine. You know,
those are proprietary owned, not always, but like they'll be,
you know, owned and distributed by the Coca Cola company.
And so they serve also as fantastic advertising. It's a
massive lit up you know thing, the logo like at
the bus station or whatever. That's what they're designed to
do is to be like a beacon of the coke
(32:06):
company out in the world.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Yeah, and we obviously, as a three three Americans, three
Georgia boys, we have a bit of a bias toward
Coca Cola. We're gonna be honest about that, but we're not.
Speaker 2 (32:20):
It's better than pepsi. We're sorry. It just pepsi tastes weird,
is off. Oh my gosh. I like products, but pepsi
the cola is not good.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
Man. I got to tell you, it's a real cultural
divide here in the US. You know, you go too
far in one direction and all of a sudden you're
in pepsi country.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
I don't trust any place that only has pepsi products.
I'm drawing a line in this. Not even Pizza Hut
don't care for it. Wow, all right, well, choose your battles.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
I got your back, Coca Cola, regardless of whether you
love them or hate them. Coca Cola was the first
company to sell their bottled dream in vending machines, and
that I love that point about advertising because it's probably
a big part of their success. And now we get
(33:09):
to the early twinklings of World War Two. The US
begins building up its defense industry.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
And now you can buy handguns in vending machines. We're
heading in that direction, y'all as a country. Sorry not
to be political, but I could, I could see it.
It's like something that would be in idiocracy.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
Yeah, they'll probably put them in the coke or the
pepsi machines, like the pre existing machines. Do you want
a fanta or do you want.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
A firearm or a glock?
Speaker 1 (33:40):
Right, So, as the US enters into a wartime economy,
they have this tremendous boom in factories, right in industrialization,
in around the clock production of things that will be
useful in war.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
The people who are in.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Charge of these factories and these plants, they say, all right,
we can't have employees working for twelve plus hours without
a refreshment break, and we're not going to pay for
a full time cafeteria staff.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
So what about vending machines? Exactly. I really really love
the term automat because it just makes me think of
like the old school I believe it was Greek automatons,
you know, the automated man or whatever, And it's such
a nostalgic thing. I think it's maybe a cup opper
painting like Nighthawks at the Diner I think is one
(34:41):
where there's this classic, you know scene of like a
New York City automat, you know, where you have like
the little windows you put your money in and then
your pie is behind this little window with a metal handle.
It's just so charming to me. And now we're starting
to see stuff like that kind of come back into
popularity with like some of these like Revolt Thing sushi
restaurants that are so popular and fun.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Sure, yeah, or there are a lot of restaurants that
use these specific vending machines where you put in the money,
you put in your yen or whatever, and then you
select the thing you want to eat, and it doesn't
give you the thing. It gives you a ticket, and
you take the ticket to a counter or you you know,
(35:27):
you walk up to the counter and someone hands you
the food. It's a it's kind of a hybrid relationship
between vending machine and actual customer service. I love an automat.
It's just a cool vibe. And during the nineteen forties
and the nineteen fifties here in the US, vending machines
were largely concentrated in plants and in factories. This is
(35:51):
where you know, this is where you think of the
break room vending machine, right, if you've ever had one
of those, and they always they always had these lands
crackers of a certain age.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
Yeah. I always can judge, like whether a company is
going to be cool to work for by whether they
have like free snacks or a vending machine in the
break room. Having the vending machine just strikes me as
being so cheap, and that is not a company I
would wish to work for, sir.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
Yeah, having a vending machine for the employees like that
always strikes me as saying we don't especially love you,
but you know, no judgment.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
We have a little judgment, a little judgment. We're curious.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
Yeah, let's be accountable, a little bit of judgment because
we have had vending machines in our operation in the past,
and I think the statute has expired here so I
can tell you this. No, the whole reason we had
vending machines in the Buckhead office is because our office manager, Michael,
owned a vending machine company.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
You're joking. I remember Michael.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
Yeah, that was early days. He's doing well, he's doing well.
Speaker 2 (37:04):
I always liked him. I remember when I first met Mike,
because I guess he went by. We installed like this
in one of the weird offices that we were converting
into a podcast studio in the earliest days of podcasting. Literally,
we just there was this open window and the traffic
noise outside. It was like a high rise, you know,
upper floor building, and we just like took a bunch
(37:27):
of egg crape foam and like stapled it to plywood
and like shoved that in the window and like that
was Man, it was so punk rock back then poil
but still better than the glass. Oh yeah, it was
so so uh so old.
Speaker 1 (37:44):
Praise due to our our colleague and our friends, Mike Campbell.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
Moving into the vending machine industry is a naturally American
thing to do. America takes the idea of the vending
machine and for a while they run with it. We
could argue that now China and Japan have accelerated the
vending machine boom that the United States pursued. You know,
(38:13):
by the end of the nineteen fifties, there are vending
machines throughout the US and they're selling not just prepackaged food,
but they're selling freshly prepared stuff to your point about automats.
Now we see another innovation in the world of soft
drink vending machines, refrigeration. The refrigeration is a huge game
(38:38):
changer because I don't care know what people think about
pepsi or coke. I'm just not European enough to enjoy
it at room temperature.
Speaker 2 (38:49):
You know, I will house a d C at room
temperature with lemon time. No, no, no, d dyed coke.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
No, I mean with leon, because Europeans put lemon.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
That's a thing they drove O. I did not know that.
But I am headed to Europe next month, so maybe
I'll give that a try. Yeah, only if I'm really thirsty.
And for me, if it's bubbly, a bubbly drink, I
can drink at room temperature because in some weird way,
the bubbles are like a stand in for it being cold.
But drinking flat room temperature soda is akin to death.
(39:22):
It is just absolutely miserable.
Speaker 1 (39:24):
Oh yeah, yeah, no, no, it needs the effort vescence,
It needs the carbonations.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
Ben, we're talking about refrigeration.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
Yeah, yes, yes, we are, we are.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
They keep us on task.
Speaker 1 (39:34):
There there's another curious thing that has been missing from
the vending machine race for a long time. It's not
until the nineteen forties that coffee vending machines are developed.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
Cool. I mean all the moving parts in that, Like
someone had to figure out what how to automatically grind
the beans and then you know, you put the cup
in and then it makes you a perfect serving size.
You know, when I think of that, I'll tell you
what I think I've been is hospitals. Oh yeah, the
coffee vending machines, you really only in my mind. I
(40:09):
think you always see it in hospitals and courthouses.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
Yeah, hospitals, courthouses, I would add again auto body shops.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
Maybe usually auto body shops these days have like a
little free coffee like service kind.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Of see going back to our point about is the
stack free or do you have to pay for it?
Speaker 2 (40:28):
This is where you're paying with your time, that's.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
For sure, the only real currency. This is where we
get to something that we foreshadowed. We we have a
lot of stuff we want to get to. We may
not get to all of it, but you you plan
it a nice seed there. Earlier in the Achilles heel
of all vending machines is their ability to figure out
(40:53):
whether the money being put in there is actual money
or actual fax money.
Speaker 2 (40:59):
Shout out the lord. Well, call back to our buddy hero,
our ancient innovator the beginning of this whole story, and
you'll recall his holy Water venue machine. You just put
a coin on a slot and it like fell, and
the weight of it was what triggered the mechanism that
(41:20):
opened the valve that then squirted out the holy water.
That is a you know, to your point, ben about you,
you mentioned that maybe there was a way so you
could determine if money was counterfeit, because in those days
it would have had to be down to the exact
weight probably or a very close exact way, because they
certainly didn't have any way of visually. The whole point
was to not have a person there, and so they
(41:42):
didn't have any kind of scanning technology, which is what
we're about to get into. So his machine had to
be like really sensitively tuned. I would think where if
he wanted to make sure people weren't just throwing a
rock in there, you know, a flat rock, that it
had to have enough weight to it, or had to
be an exact enough weight, and me, maybe I'm giving
them too much credit. But that is sort of a
(42:02):
rudimentary way of thinking about maybe pre technology that could
scan ways of determining whether money was real. It would
have to be like, it would be the exact right circumference,
you know, and only then could it go down the slot,
you know, to get into the mechanism to trigger the
treat Think.
Speaker 1 (42:18):
Of all the think of all all the comic strips
and old cartoons of a little scampy deadnis the mints
type kids stringing putting, the putting a string around a
quarter and then dropping in the vending machine and getting
their thing and yoinking it out. That this is a
hidden history fact that you only get for listening through
(42:40):
uh the rest of the show. The reason that coins
in the United States have ridges on them, the quarter
and the dimes, it's because it's because they wanted to
prevent fraud in vending machines. An American quarter has one
(43:01):
hundred and nineteen ridges, dimes have one hundred and eighteen ridges.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
It's so cool the earliest forms of these they could
build a mechanism that could detect that because they certainly
didn't have any kind of you know, electronic scanning ability.
You know, we get a little further into still very rudimentary,
but a little more advanced technology when they started accepting dollars.
Dollar bills have I think they still are maybe it's
(43:27):
a QR code now or sorry, an RFID, but were
embedded with a piece of magnetic tape that had information
embedded on it. And these early machines that took a
buck could scan that to verify that it was in
fact an authentic dollar.
Speaker 1 (43:42):
Yeah, they were using it was similar to eight track technology.
Early vending machines had this magnetic tape head mechanism that
determined whether a single one dollar bill had the correct
amount of iron content. But the issue, Oh, that's.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
Say, I got it kind of wrong. I thought it
was it was detecting that that little strip that was
embedded inside. Maybe that was later. This is even cooler
and more rudimentary, So it was scanning for a certain
element in the dollar. That's insane.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, this, Uh, there's this arm race between you know,
the deadis medici or the deadis minicis UH and the
people who don't want to get ripped off with their
vending machines because later, uh, laser printers can use iron
laced ink to make counterfeit dollars in what we would
(44:38):
call an entirely unnecessary and ridiculous scam.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
Yeah that's true. Yeah, I got a wonder like the
are people actually profiting off of counterfeit money? It just
seems like that is a scam that is going to
catch up to you sooner than.
Speaker 1 (44:51):
Later, especially in an increasingly cashless society.
Speaker 2 (44:54):
Also true.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yeah, true.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
So starting in the nineteen nineties, we start to see
digital scanning technology. I guess you could call it maybe
an early form of low resolution, low pixel count digital photography. Yeah, yeah,
this is really cool, right.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
The device is looking for specific patterns, and if your
dollar doesn't have that pattern, it will not be accepted.
This is the real reason why crumply dollar bills often
don't work in a vending machine. I always thought I
always thought it was just because I hadn't been neat
(45:36):
enough with my folded Sorry.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
No, I mean I think that probably has something to
do with it, too, but it Yeah, if the image
is distorted like that because of all the different crumples,
then the scanner's not gonna be able to read it,
especially in an older machine.
Speaker 1 (45:50):
And of course we are coming to you live in
twenty twenty five from the threshold of the future.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
Of our live album. It's gonna be a double LP
Ridiculous History Live in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
Yeah, it's gonna be super relevant in twenty twenty eight.
We'll probably still be doing this show.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
Do you think so? I hope so. I'd like to
think so. I'd like to think so too. What do
you think, Max? Are you down?
Speaker 1 (46:16):
Do you want to hang out with us for a
few more years?
Speaker 3 (46:19):
So, however, refer to this show as I'm like, yeah,
we do two episodes a week with a classic every
week until the sun absorbs the earth.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
There you go, Yeah, you go, that's a good deadline.
I'm cool.
Speaker 3 (46:32):
I'm like, it's one of those things where it's like,
I don't know that. That's not means saying if I
want to or not. It's more just saying, oh wow, okay,
I am I'm your bound you are bound not to
be too pronancy.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
But I actually thought of you Max when I was
I was watching something earlier, and I am putting a
screenshot in the chat for later anyway, WHOA, I love you. No,
you're on the chat too, Okay, I'm look forward to
the secret. So, uh, so we're not going to spend
(47:05):
too much time on the future of vending machines. Please
know your cultural mileage may vary.
Speaker 2 (47:12):
Yeah, I mean for sure in term, I guess when
we're talking about the future, we're talking about the way
payment forms have changed and will change, you know. I mean,
I don't know if you've seen these, but I guess
you could call these vending machines and a lot of
gas stations. You'll see these crypto machines, right, Yeah, who
uses those? It seems like somebody pulled pulled a fast
(47:33):
one with that. I don't think it really took off.
Speaker 1 (47:36):
Okay, explain this to me because I've seen them, You
and I haven't talked about them.
Speaker 2 (47:40):
What are they really able to deposit and withdraw crypto
from the blockchain on them? Supposedly, but I've never seen
one in you literally ever, Like, why would you need that?
You do it all online. That's the whole point of crypto.
But anyway, sketchy, it's weird. Like I said, I think
someone pulled a fast one, had a little fly by
night operation. But what we are going to start seeing
(48:04):
is for vending machines to have more and more flexible
payment options like I do love most vending machines that
you see. Now you can do the Apple pay, tap
to pay, and that's just becoming increasingly a thing that
you're going to start seeing on everything, not to mention
vending machines that use ultra violet scanners to authenticate cash,
(48:24):
measuring the amount of glow that gets emitted. Genuine notes
contain fluorescent ink, so it's going to glow. It's almost
like the like a forensic way of looking for like
bodily fluids at a crime scene. But increasingly, as we
to your point, ben are becoming more and more and
more of a cashless society, even a cashless world, you're
going to start seeing machines like the way that cars
(48:46):
stopped having CD players or the way that laptops stopped
having disk drives.
Speaker 1 (48:51):
You know that's a good I don't know, those are
two really good comparisons for this. We are going to
see vending machines continue because they satisfy some basic human needs, right,
the number one being the need for food and water,
or something like food or something like water, or the
(49:14):
need for speed or the need for speed, and it's
all motivated by the vending machine. Manufacturer's need for greed.
Speaker 2 (49:24):
That's very good, Ben, that's very style. Well played, my friend. Well,
I think you mentioned this at the top or maybe
in a conversation we had off Mike, But you know,
you you are a fan of Japan. The country and
the country of Japan is and has long been considered
like since it's kind of I don't know, reinvention of itself,
you know, after it was sort of decimated by some
(49:46):
bombs that we drop, you know, just a hey beacon
of technology and innovation, and within that you're seeing some
really weird and innovative uses of vending machines, like think
claw machines as well a arcades. They've always been on
the cutting edge. Yeah, we didn't even talk about how
pinball machines kind of came into being around the same
(50:07):
time as the New York City kind of vending machine boom.
But Ben, Japan is known for having really interesting and
weird stuff in its vending machines, which are absolutely everywhere.
And I'm excited to go about a year, but you've
been a bunch of times. Can you set the scene,
like how common are these things are? They literally everywhere?
(50:30):
Are what is in them? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (50:32):
I cannot wait for you guys to go with me
on the next trip. We're going to have such a time,
and as long as we have a couple of coins,
we're never going to be thirsty.
Speaker 2 (50:47):
Or in need of socks. Right right.
Speaker 1 (50:49):
By far, the most common vending machines in urban areas
of Japan are beverage machines. They'll sell they'll sell coffee,
they'll sell soda, they'll sell something I still don't quite
understand named pakari sweat.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
I've seen that in the in the Asian markets and Asia. Yeah,
it gets it's an energy drink. No, sorry, it's a
sports drink like electrolyte kind of replenishr or whatever.
Speaker 1 (51:16):
That's also know, it's a weird one, but you know, again,
who are we to judge. I do have an interesting
conspiracy about vending machines in Japan. You don't see a
ton of machines selling prepackaged stacks, and that's because restaurants
are likewise ubiquitous, so you don't want to take money
(51:37):
from the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (51:38):
That's my idea.
Speaker 1 (51:39):
But I did earlier. I think it was, oh gosh,
it must have been February. I ran into a pizza
vending machine.
Speaker 2 (51:48):
Like hot pizza discike, it's like an entire pie or
a slice. Yeah, yeah, it made a pizza, It makes
it for you. So this is taking the automation aspect
of it to a hole, just wild.
Speaker 1 (51:59):
But that's not even you know, what we're setting up
here is when you and Max and I and maybe
you as well, ridiculous historians head back to Japan. Those
are the bare like, those are the low threshold of
weird vending machines. We've heard tell of vending machines for bugs.
I haven't seen that, but I believe it because there
(52:21):
are a lot of There are a lot of strange
vending machines.
Speaker 2 (52:26):
Have you heard of the Japanese used pante vending machine?
And bust? We had to mention it, right, tell us
a little well, you know, in Tokyo. I think, in particular,
there was a brief period of time and I don't know,
I just remember when it was reported or when I
(52:47):
first read about it, maybe in the early two thousands
or maybe even late nineties, where you could buy women's
used under garments from a vending machine to feed some
kind of you know, a fetish.
Speaker 1 (53:03):
Yeah, yeah, I've never personally seen those, and I think
you make a I think you make a good point
because because it was a story that was reported in
the West, it was very much a real thing. But
I don't know if they're around anymore.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
There's no article on tech nin tech tech in Asia.
All right, I'm trying to read the r tech in
asia dot com the death and digital records resurrection of
Japan's used pante vending machine. So yeah, it's definitely it
gets in the mix, but you know, let's get wholesome
with it. There's also like amazing venue machines that sell
(53:41):
kind of like the old coin op where you put
a stack of quarters in and turn a crank and
then you get a little toy inside a plastic bubble.
Those are everywhere in Japan. Yeah, with all kinds of stuff.
There are entire.
Speaker 1 (53:56):
Almost like twenty four hour laundromat area. You know, if
you've ever been to a place where you've got washers
and dryers and they're all automated, there's no staff there.
You just go in and you put your coins in,
you do your laundry. There are places like that in
Japan entirely.
Speaker 2 (54:14):
For gatchapon makes sense and say same as like claw
machine parlors, you.
Speaker 1 (54:19):
Know, yeah, yeah, just so just so we also.
Speaker 2 (54:22):
Sometimes there'll be a combination where they'll have like half
claw machines and half goatchapons. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, combination.
Speaker 1 (54:28):
Right, And there are also ramen vending machines. We talk ramen,
not just prepackaged ramen, right, yes, yeah, yeah, hot ready
to eat ramen. There are also food ticket machines. There
are weird not quite gambling things where you can put
in some money for a mystery prize and it could
(54:52):
be you know, it could be like a picture of
a musician, or it could be a Nintendo.
Speaker 2 (54:59):
Switch go yeah, like a like a blind box, you know. Yeah,
I've seen these vending machines or I guess they're kind
of considered a game where it's like this one giant glass,
you know, enclosure with a mass single massive stuffed animal
suspended by a little string and the game as you
put in, you know, it's going to be more of
(55:20):
a premium than the smaller item claw machines, and you
get the opportunity to like operate these scissors that like
will snip the string, and if you can sniff the string,
you get this one giant prize. The whole question of
like the investment of actual funds and the comparison to
how much the thing that you've won is actually worth
(55:43):
is a discussion under itself. But it is fun to
find places though, where it doesn't feel like the machines
are rigged. But Ben, we talked about used pante machines
and the kind of mythology of that. You're also going
to see things like adult item vending machines, though not
typically would be in the in the in the courtyard
of the public square, because they they're pretty if I'm
(56:06):
not mistaken, Ben Japan has a bit of a modesty still,
even with its forward facing advertisement. It's it's a little
bit wholesome. Right.
Speaker 1 (56:15):
Well, again, I would say it goes back to location. Yeah,
So back in the day, as we established earlier, there
was this realization that the best way to sell stamps
or to sell postcards is to put the machine at
a place where people need stamps and the postcards, and.
Speaker 2 (56:32):
The naughty machines are probably more likely to be in
like the naughty shops, yes, in the naughty districts, yes, right.
Speaker 1 (56:39):
Right right straight up Shinjuku. But we also know that
you can see. You can see the same struggle that
the US had with tobacco vending machines in Japan, you know,
like alcohol vending.
Speaker 2 (56:57):
Machines, sake machines, right, yeah, there, we don't have those here.
We don't. We don't all no alcohol venus. It's completely
illegal in the United States. Now.
Speaker 1 (57:07):
In Japan, there are still cigarette vending machines, but there's
a much more robust law about it. You have to
have an I D And a special card and also.
Speaker 2 (57:19):
Have to be scanned and validated by the way, yep, right,
big brother is watching you. Here's the thing. I think
we we have to wrap up.
Speaker 1 (57:28):
But I think the best idea we had so far
is a vending machine that sells vending machines.
Speaker 2 (57:38):
I'm writing that down, and within those are tinier vending machines.
Speaker 1 (57:43):
It's just vending machines all the way down. It's dolls, right,
And I can't I can't wait. I can't wait to
explore new parts of the world with you guys, and
to find the weirdest vending machines we can. Uh, what
what would you what would you love in a vending machine?
Speaker 2 (58:05):
Oh? I know I already, I know you too. Well.
Speaker 1 (58:07):
I know what vending machine you would love. You'd love
a synth vending machine.
Speaker 2 (58:11):
Yeah, and that's you know the thing about that is
like I've certainly been to shops that you can put
anything in a vending machine. And I've certainly seen in
some like boutiki type places, whether they be record stores
or music stores, they'll have a vending machine that they'll
have some fun little items inside, you know, where it's
like you can get like a little grab bag item
like of some weird local art or something like that,
(58:32):
And I just think that's so fun. But yeah, a
synth venning machine would be rad. Though I would hope
that it wouldn't just drop it, you know, into the
chasm for me to go. No, No, it needs to
build up before it drops the beat. How are you
handed to me by a little robot arm with fingerless
gloves on? Sure? Max?
Speaker 1 (58:51):
What about your vending machine? What's your dream vending machine?
Speaker 2 (58:54):
Oh? Man, dream vending machine?
Speaker 3 (58:56):
That is a good question. I I like, for years
ago up in coffee, but I'm caffeine free now because yeah.
Speaker 2 (59:03):
It's okay, we're still we can still be friends. I
don't know, I maybe tea.
Speaker 3 (59:10):
I'm getting really into tea. I was also thinking about
games venning machine, but then also we used to have
those and they sucked, So go on PlayStation storing in
my video games. So I know I would like a
vending machine that I could buy more versions of myself,
because that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (59:27):
We had in this world the Betrishka maxis. I love it. Yeah,
I like it. I dig it.
Speaker 1 (59:32):
Tell us what your dream vending machine would be. Visit
us on our Facebook page, Ridiculous Historians. Yes, we are
still working to get our social media platforms back.
Speaker 2 (59:44):
We've got a plan. We're gonna stick Max on. We've
been discussed Max. You weren't present at this meeting, but
we're sticking Max on the on the medic boys. I
get it straight. I handled back. I straight up told
this was weird.
Speaker 1 (59:58):
I know you got it and old, but I straight
up told our folks in marketing you have to burn
the village to save the village. And they let me
get away with saying that on a work call.
Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
Oh you know, what are they gonna do? Well?
Speaker 1 (01:00:11):
Hopefully they will join us in future episodes, and we
hope you do as well. Thank you so much for
tuning in. Ridiculous historians. Thank you as always to our
super producer mister Max Williams, as well as his biological
brother Alex Williams, a mad composer who word on the
street has has it that he just recently drifted through town.
Speaker 2 (01:00:34):
I'm actually going to see him this very evening. He's
coming over to the studio to do some be booping.
I'm excited. So he actually also composed and be booped
this very theme that you hear in your very ears.
Huge thanks to Christopher Hasiotis and Eve Jeff Coates here
in spirit.
Speaker 1 (01:00:51):
Big big thanks of course to aj Bahamas Jacobs and
you're right, You're right, Max. We we got to get
him back on the back together big things. Yeah, yeah,
we were all right. Big thanks to BADASSU, the Badass imperator,
Ben Thompson, Rachel Big Spinach Lance and I think Donald.
Speaker 2 (01:01:13):
Strickland from earlier in a regular Dude from time to time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:01:20):
Well, Jonathan is still a little heated with us folks
behind the curtain because he wrote an entire quister.
Speaker 2 (01:01:28):
Segment and we just did not do it when we
were in the Middle East. Well, I think it's a
he's got it in his back pocket for next time.
It means it went have to do as much prep.
Geez Ben, Thanks to you, this was a really fine conversation.
Speaker 1 (01:01:41):
And thanks to our research associate Jeff.
Speaker 2 (01:01:44):
Thanks to for the good conversational fodder. Good Jeff, thank
you very.
Speaker 1 (01:01:48):
Much, and thanks to everybody who has run into a
weird vending machine.
Speaker 2 (01:01:55):
Please post pictures. I want to see weird like the
anthropomorphic vending machines with arms and legs, come alive at
night and have a whole like inner life, you know,
like a toy story. But with any machines, we'll see
a nice tep folks. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
(01:02:16):
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
for tuning in. Let's hear it for the Man, the
myth Legend, our super producer, mister Max Williams, the top.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Remember how I started saying Zan's a bargain.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
We all just went with it. I think I stole
hisah from Lauren Vogelbam Actual facts, Lauren Actual Facts, Vogel
bumb love it.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I mean, I think we should bring Zan's bar back
to be like Kahokia.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
I sometimes said via text, say hazoo exclamation.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Uh, well, we're going to put a quarter in our
local podcast vending machine and that's a that's ridiculous history,
and hopefully our snack doesn't get stuck and we have
to shake that thing because that's part of the history
of vending machines and hopefully we're talking about today we're
only touching a vending machine for snacks as we are
(01:27):
going to learn. Uh, vending machines vend a lot of things,
ridiculous stuff.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're Noel Brown. I'm I'm Ben Bolling. Uh.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
I think before we teamed up with our research associate
Jeff Bartlett, Uh, we were all kind of curious about
where vending machines come from because nowadays they're ubiquitous and noel.
You know, if I'm in Japan, there there are ountless
(02:00):
vending machines. If if you and I are walking through
let's say, what's.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
That the airport. The airport, they have been the machines
for everything at the airport, snacks like you know, sandwiches,
high value, Yes, exactly, and good.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
I think it's a good thing that there are cottoms
in vending machines, you know, in the.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Airport, especially when you want to join the Mile High Club,
which is actually be safe about it.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Yeah, actually the Mile High Club has Uh it sounds
cooler than it is. We are a PG thirteen show
cool secrets.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
I mean, plane bathrooms are awful just to use, They're awful.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
They're so small, they flushed so aggressively, like it gives
me a start every time, like oh, it's like I
feel like I'm gonna get sucked out of the planes
in that little hole.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
It's the pause too, because you hit the flush button
and then there's like two or three seconds before it
just evacuates.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
Yeah, it has to be that a cross stuff though,
because shoots it shoots it out over over the over
the out into the air instantly, you know it is.
I didn't think so no longer true good, although I did.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
See a meme I guess notly meme with more of
an Internet video of cruise ships just straight up mass
dumping waste into the ocean and it's legal as long
as there are a certain distance offshore.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
They have Matthews Surbus right.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
On the on the water taxi in Chicago. Oh, never forget,
never forget, never forget.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Also, U cruise ships are one of the few things
that are currently not sold in a vending machine, and
that's probably just due to the size of the cruise ship.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
This is very true, but I would argue or pose
it that there are vending machines on many cruise ships.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
I know, and I want a vending machine that sells
vending machines, you know what I mean, wake up car.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
But that is a pretty awesome art installation. Idea is
a vending machine that sells tiny replicas of vending machines
with different stuff in them, so you can get like
the snack vending machine and then collect them all like Pokemon.
I'll be honest.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Sorry, I'm not meaning to take its even further off,
but it reminds me of that season one Rick and
Morty episode where they're jumping through universes.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
You know, it's not that one's.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
The uh, it's actually the one where we first meet
Evil Morri. Spoilers this first season though, But it's like
it's a rotation of four things. It's humans, pizza, phone,
and chairs. So in one universe is like a chair
talking into a human ordering, uh, sitting out a pizza ordering.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
It's hard to redo them all.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
It's all it's all for iterations of those right, and
we see there this What was I gonna say? Oh,
I was gonna mention this. We have to at the
top a few A little while back, I can't remember
how long ago, Noel, you and our pal Matt, Frederick
and a couple of other folks visited Miao Wolf. You know,
(05:14):
we all went together and they had they had Mega
mart yes, Mega mar oh Mega Bart and they had
a very interesting spin on vending machines.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Psycho telling waves. Yeah, yeah, and.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
What I think we're all surprised to learn is that
vending machines are.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
Actually pretty old.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Our story begins with a guy named Hero or Heroon
or Heron of Alexandria uh in ancient Egypt. This guy
purportedly invented the first vending machine and it was not
It was not selling snacks, so it was not selling
cruise ships or condoms. It was selling holy water, of course.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Because you know, for when you need some in a pinch.
This is a smart fellow. He's a mathematician, an engineer,
and obviously an inventor. He, among many other incredible innovations
that still kind of remain very very relevant today, invented
the windwheel, which is, you know, obviously kind of a
(06:27):
certainly something that's been developed to generate hydro electric power
and wind power, et cetera. He published some very detailed
schematics of a device called the a low pile also
known as Heroes enginem.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Yeah, and that was a that was like a steam
powered mechanism. Some of his ideas clearly come from earlier
Greek inventors and mathematicians. And when we whenever we talked
about Hero of Alexandria, we have to acknowledge that a
lot of his original stuff has been lost to time.
(07:08):
It makes me wonder whether our pal Ben Thompson from
Badass of the Week has covered hero like imagine being
so cool that your name becomes a noun or a
descriptor for other cool people.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Is that is that true? Is this the hero that
that is referencing?
Speaker 1 (07:29):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I always assume, Okay, Maybeeah. You certainly was scientifically and
innovatively heroic. And if you want to dig in a
little beyond the scope of what we're going to talk
about today to his life, you can check out a
great profile on the Famous people dot com Hero of Alexandria.
You can just search for it. There. Really great site
(07:50):
and great resource.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
I'm looking it up. A hero comes from a Greek
word that means protector or defender, and it later gets
adapted into Latin.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Yeah, I don't know, you.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Know what, would he have just been named hero as
like like before or after hero became a byword for
being awesome.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
It's a good question, Ben, But of his many innovations,
he was very much responsible for the kind of proto
vending machine and it certainly didn't involve all of the
same electronics. And you know ability to use different types
of payment, you know, the thing you can slide the
dollar into and have it spit back out at you
over and over and over again. But it did accept
(08:39):
a coin. This thing very much was way ahead of
its time.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Yeah, let's put on our house stuff works hats and
get a little deeper here. The coin would be inserted
into a slot. From there it would fall onto a pan.
The pan is connected to a lever. The lever opens
a valve through which holy water flows out, and the
(09:05):
pan keeps moving under the weight of the coin until
eventually the coin slides off. We know that there wasn't
really any kind of like governmental oversight on ensuring this
was holy water exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
The quality control there.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
Right, they didn't really have QA at that level. But
the the mechanics make sense, right, and these have to
be coins of a certain weight to operate the mechanism.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Well, I mean, I would imagine that coins back then
would have been pretty beefy.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
I imagine so as well. You know, it's also a
way a clever way of finding counterfeit coins, possibly the lever.
After the coin slides off the pan, the lever raises
back to its normal starting state. Which closes the valve
which stops the flow of water. Now, hero or Heron
(10:03):
or Heroon as he's sometimes called, did not describe this
as a vending machine, and he didn't say, you know,
this is going to be an awesome way to sell
Nestley crunch bars in the future. He said, this is
a sacrificial vessel. And the entire reason this first vending
(10:25):
machine exists is not to make it easy for people
to buy stuff. It is to limit the amount of
holy water people can use at an ancient temple.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Like they want to limit the supply, you reduce the
circulations and ultimate control over holiness.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Yeah, kind of like if you're in a if you're
in a public restroom and there's you know, there's a
specific timer on the hand dryer, right or the air dryer.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Oh sure, Or in Europe, and I'm sure in Japan
in any other countries, a lot of public restrooms are
pay and that money is used, I would imagine to
help the upkeep of the facility, and consequently those bathrooms
are some of the cleanest I've ever encountered. I think
when you have a little bit of a literal buy in,
(11:16):
it might make you behave a little better.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
You know, Yes, there is definitely some there's definitely some
psychology at play there. For the pay to I almost
have pay to play public restrooms, pay to pay right, Yes, yes,
if we fast forward to I mean fast forward quite
(11:40):
a long time, Max, give us a fast forward queue. Boom.
We're in the eighteenth century. We're in England now, Hero
of Alexandria is long gone, but the idea of vending
machines is having a moment. They are these things called
(12:03):
had you ever heard of this nole that were called
honor boxes?
Speaker 2 (12:07):
No, no, tell me about honor boxes.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
I mean they're vending machines with a fancier name.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Sounds like something you would pay your indulgences into for
the church, you know, put your money in the honor
box for absolution.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
Or like a weird Victorian euphemism. It does sound like
a glory whole kind of situation.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
I'm sorry the quiet part out loud.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Yeah, but the otter box, No, I can't get out
of it.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
That's a case the honor I thought you said otter box. Oh,
the otter box is a different thing. But they're pretty good,
solid cases. And we're not sponsored. Yeah, yeah, we just
used them.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
So these things were early vending machines that were operated
via coin, and they were used to sell tobacco and snow.
Uh snuff for anybody not born in the in the
seventeen hundreds. Uh snuff is a thing where like every
(13:10):
time you see someone in a film take out a
small container and then sniff it really quickly if it's.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Either snuff cocaine there there. But yeah, right right in
Victorian times, I mean people would literally dab dab dab
the snuff onto their hand and like take a rip
of it, you know. I mean it's wild. It's such
finely ground tobacco that you would sniff. It seems so
gross to me. I mean it's wild that people would
(13:40):
seems like their nasal passages would get real funky, real quick.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Yeah, you know, we're not a judgmental group here. A
ridiculous thing too, by the way, I think people really
I would.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
Think, but we are curious it does exist. Yeah, snuff
is still a thing. You can. It's it's sort of
like old timey, but it's considered smokeless tobacco. Finely ground
or pulverized leaves its snorted or sniffed into the nasal cavity,
and that is still done today by a certain type
I imagine. Okay, yes, fancy do they wear white gloves
(14:15):
while they do it? It just seems like so victorian to me, right,
you know, do they have to wear a peruke?
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Can you use snuff while you're not wearing you know,
men's leggings or stockings. Look, we're not a judgmental group,
but we are curious.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
So if you are, If you.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
Are, or if you know someone who engages with snuff,
just tell us about it on our Facebook group Ridiculous
Historians anyway. Look, so, yes, the first vending machine probably
holy Water. The next boom of vending machines probably tobacco, and.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
Far a walk okay, walk us through it.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
I can't far so all right, these these things are
these honor boxes are portable brass mechanisms, contraptions really, and
they are a huge boon for the tobacco industry overall.
(15:19):
They are our next big step in the commercialization and
the emerging ubiquity of vending machines as a concept kind.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Of makes sense if you think about it, because if
you maybe it's an age thing. But in my mind,
one of the classic styles of vending machines that you
see less and less of these days is the cigarette
machine with the big old clunky, you know, slot machine
type pull things. You know, it makes a really good
chunk sound. And you still will see them at bars
(15:50):
and taverns. And there are more modern ones that I've seen,
mainly in Europe, but in America, if you see them
at all, it's going to be the super old timing style,
one which which had to have evolved, you know, from
these honor boxes some way.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
One hundred percent. Yeah, and there, you know, now that
I'm thinking about it, those are so old school. I
remember a lot of them were actually old because yeah, yeah,
I remember one of my relatives told me years back
now that that was the way to know you were
in a bad place.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Told me that's a little broad, but okay, glad they
were looking out for you. If you see one.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
Of those machines, right, yeah, you're in a place you
shouldn't be.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
You're in grave danger. Right.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
It was a little intense, but I'm sure the those
intense intentions were noble. In the nineteenth century, the eighteen hundreds,
we see the introduction of stamp and newspaper vending machines.
And do you guys remember back when people.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Were their old school thing? You don't see it. Well,
you just sort of see those newspaper boxes every now
and the end, not nearly as much as you used to.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
No, no, back, I was gonna say, do you remember
when people read newspapers?
Speaker 2 (17:09):
Yeah, it's quaint almost these days. And as we know,
a lot of those legacy newspapers are certainly struggling with
that with the circulation of their physical print copies, and
they really rely a lot on like spoke subscriptions for
the people that actually want a real paper to hold,
you know, and the Sunday Times and all of that
good stuff.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Tell us a little bit about Richard Carlyle.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
He was the one responsible for these newspaper boxes in
eighteen twenty two. He actually came up with these in
order to do a little, i don't know, work around
to avoid censorship by distributing the papers through automated means. Yeah,
(17:53):
and this is this is huge.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
We're seeing a resurgence of things like this through some
local innition. Here in Atlanta, Georgia, where we record this podcast,
there are these like everybody has a little free library now.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
Talking about the little little boxes, the.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Little banded, little band book libraries.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Oh well, yeah, there's certainly that. There's that's that's awesome.
I love.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Yeah, those are repurposed old newspaper vending machines.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
Aha, So I don't think I've seen those, but I
have certainly seen in lots of different cities those kind
of little mailbox style like leave a book, take a
book kind of boxes. Free libraries for sure. Yeah, exactly,
that's exactly what you're talking about, Ben, But he is
doing this because he's able to kind of sort of
skirt the authorities by distributing banned materials through these boxes.
(18:47):
Simon Denham was another innovator who's responsible for creating a
stamp dispensing machine. In eighteen sixty seven, he patented it
and that was kind of the next step of vending evolution.
It represented the first fully automatic vending machine. Uh. And
this it just kind of just you know, snowballed from there. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Yeah, this is cool because already we're learning so much
more about vending machines. So just a recap, we've got
holy water, the limiting of holy water, not selling it,
just like keeping people from using all of it at once.
Then we've got tobacco and snuff, which I still think
(19:28):
mystifies both of us. And then but right, and then
we have fighting against censorship, and then we have people
selling stamps. So naturally, you know, it would make sense
that the rest of the world looked around and said,
what else can we put in these machines?
Speaker 2 (19:48):
Anything? Sky's the limit, and it truly was the limit.
In eighteen eighty three, a guy named Perceval ever it
was the first to truly innovate some of these previous
kind of iteration the vending machine into a form much
more resembling what we know today as modern vending machines
and these dispense postcards. So this would be that kind
(20:09):
of this the curly queue kind of design. Right, Okay,
you have a thing and then a little curly cue,
and then another thing, and then that's another thing with
a quirkscrew, and the mechanism turns and causes the thing
in the front to drop, you know, out of the
front of the thing into a trough that you can
then reach down and grab it.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
That's cool, yeah, yeah, yeah. And this is a kind
of old school vending machine approach that I personally associate
with with auto repair shops weirdly enough, because you go
into the waiting room and then there you go.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Or oil change places.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Yeah yeah, oil change places as well, and they'll have
the vending machine, you know, with the elderly cheese its
and the vintage em and.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
M's aged if you please, aged very well.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Heaven for fends that we would ever we would ever
disparage the Noble Lines Company.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
Oh yes, jesuits.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
So all right, this this design you're describing their Percival's invention.
These vending machines are able to sell all kinds of
stationary right, envelopes, but also notepaper postcards. And as this
stuff propagates throughout train stations and post offices, we see
(21:35):
that there's something crucial in the vending machine concept here.
Its location, right. A vending machine that sells envelopes just
on insert random street corner here, that's not going to
do as well as a machine that sells envelopes at
(21:55):
the literal post office.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
It's not.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
You know, if you're at a railway station and you
want to send a postcard to friends or family, that's
where a vending machine comes in, right.
Speaker 2 (22:07):
Yeah, Or if you're at the train station waiting for
a train. It's a perfect place to have a little
snacky machine, which is what we start to see in
the UK with the establishment of I love the term.
I mean to say, by the way, so the sweet
Meat Automatic Delivery Company in eighteen eighty seven sweet meat
of course, or maybe you don't know, it refers to
(22:30):
like a treat. You know, a piece of candy is
a sweet meat. You hear him say, I Monty Python.
Sometimes it's funny you say that.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
I was just watching some excellent money Python interviews last night.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Yeah, let's say they're the best some of my fa
I mean the Flying Circus. There's still sketches that I
come across that I haven't seen. And it's like the
British equivalent of kids in the Hall, kind of like
the Flying Circus is phenomenal if anyone hasn't Some people
don't even know it exists, Like they know the movies
and stuff, but they don't know there's a good the
Parrot sketch, The Parrots Sketch. I guess maybe that's true. Yes,
(23:14):
I'm saying a lot of people don't maybe realize how
deep a catalog it is. Oh yeah, and what a
wealth of treasures there is to find. Yes, yeah, agreed.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
I would love to see a muddy python sketch about
a vending machine.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
Or there's one. The one I remember learning sweetmeats from
was there's a sketch about this company that's like debuting
this new box of chocolates, and each one of them
is more unpleasant than the next. And the yeah, it
is called crunchy frog, and it's crunchy because it's got
the bones in it still. And like there's another one
where like it's like you you take a bite of
(23:50):
it and it shoots steel bolts out into your cheeks, yes,
and cheeks from the inside, and they call it a
sweet meat.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
I remember this because you can tell that the pythons
got together and sometimes they just wrote a list of
phrases or a riff on an idea, and then they
built a sketch around it. What I was gonna say is,
we could do a pretty cool sketch about vending machines.
We just need accounting to pay for a vending machine,
(24:17):
and we'll do it, you know, because we are people
in the United States, and American ingenuity really comes into
the foreground in the late eighteen hundreds. Thanks to the
Thomas Adams Gum Company. These guys make gum vending machines
in eighteen eighty.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Eight, yep, and they were really popular in New York
City on you guessed it train platforms. And this truly
set off the I guess We've said this multiple times,
like and this is the one that set off the
vending machine craze, but no, this really did it. The
Pulver Manufacturing Company added a little fun twist to these
gum vending machines by including little toys and little figurines
(25:02):
like based, I don't know how much action you were
going to get. I'm picturing like those really sad wrestling
figures that like you're just tiny, and the way of
it all with.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
No points of articulation. Yeah, but this is still cool as.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
This is entertainment is what it became, you know, not
just crucial everyday items. Now it's like the sky's the
limit truly. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Yeah, what I was going to say is this is
straight seahorse teeth, you know, it's it's never one of
vending machine that sells seahorse teeth. Yeah, and hot cheese.
So we we see this this idea again, like we've
been continually returning to this concept that one could indeed
(25:47):
sell anything, limited only by the size of the thing
being sold and the the finances of the potential customer.
If we go to eighteen ninety three, just a few
years later, we'll see a German chocolate manufacturer with the
name I absolutely adore stover Stoverk sold their chocolate in
(26:13):
vending machines. They also sold, of course, chewing gum, cigarettes, matches,
and soap. I feel like someone in the executive room
or someone in the boardroom at Stolverk made this machine
up for them.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
Sure you know, it's whatever it takes. I mean, if
you think about it, though, Ben, it totally makes sense
that this as a concept has been around for so long.
I mean, to me, it's like the earliest idea of
this would be literally putting something on a table and
a little you know, dish to put your money in
and trusting people to pay for the items they take. Which,
(26:51):
by the way, in I believe it's Switzerland, there are
like honor system vending machine for like cheese and stuff
and on these like hiking trails up in the up
in the Alps and Swiss Alps.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Jump in here real quick, it's not offending machine. But
one thing I find really cool in Seattle is it's
the public transit is on honor system. Basically like there
is you pay for the ticket and uh, you tap
it on. Somebody charged you for the ride, but there's
nothing stopping you. You can just walk on. And I
think the design behind it is like if somebody needs
to get somewhere, it doesn't have the money, you'd rather
(27:30):
than just walk onto the train.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
Yeah, then getting shot for like fair jumping at the
New York like that or.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
Like yeah, or like not be able to work to
make money for sure. Yeah, And so then it's just
like you know, it's for me. I'm like, I like
that and I pay for it every single time because.
Speaker 2 (27:48):
And and the proof is in the pudding as far
as like what funds are being generated and are they
able to sustain themselves. It's like a public service like
that shouldn't be operated like a profit, you know, making business.
Shout out to the post office. Post office got some problems.
I'm gonna get on my post office box again. I
(28:09):
just and I when I say it's got some problems,
it's because of funding. But and also like who buys
stamps anymore. Everyone ships things or or you know, Amazon,
I'm sure has put an absolute dent.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Part of it's a cell phone. Well, but I'm not.
I'm not gonna get the stop box.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
What do you mean by cell phone? The post office
has been sabotaged.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Yeah, there's a law those past almost two decades ago
now Ben that basically they have to backfund retirement funds
like a ridiculous amount. And what it does is just keeps.
It turned a department that had been profitable forever to
this what it is now we should do. And people
(28:50):
believe that this was intentional to get rid of.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
The post I'm one of those people. Of those people
to maybe, Ben, this is more of stuff they don't
want you to know. But this is news to me
and I'd love to find out more. But as we
roll into the twentieth century, we're going to get to
answering some of this questions that I know you all
have out there, like how does the machine know your
money is real? We'll get into that in a bit.
(29:14):
But the kind of more modern vending machine boom came
after the twenties, when up to that point in America,
at least penny candies had kind of been really the
only game in town, which you know isn't going to
make you a pile of money. But when you're selling
full priced items like food products or cigarettes a packet
(29:35):
of cigarettes, that's when the money really starts to flow,
and you'll see whole businesses selling their stock entirely through
networks of vending machines.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
Oh, before we move on, I've got to say it ridiculous.
Historians you may find this but fuddling as well as
Noel Max. I think you guys will, I think you
guys will enjoy this. Do you know what these penny
candy or hard care indie products were called.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
In the UK? Sweetmeats, boiled sweets, boiled sweets. Yeah, another
very off putting, very British.
Speaker 1 (30:09):
It's like barley water or spotted dick. What are the
other ones? Oh man, it's so strange with oak brown sauce.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
Treacle tarts. Yeah, what's going on with that? What's up?
Sounds like poo When I hear treacle, I think of
and pepe.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
I don't know why, imagine, I'm just imagining the idea
of would you like a boiled sweet?
Speaker 2 (30:35):
And so sounds like something the child catcher would say.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
Yeah, it sounds like someone should look into that anyhow. Anyhow,
we have reached a pivotal point as you described there.
Vending machine manufacturers realize that they can up their profits
by selling more sophisticated products. Right, A pack of cigarettes
(31:02):
takes more work than you know, boiled sweets or hard candy.
Speaker 2 (31:08):
So weird, it's such a weird phrase.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Anyway, So you could easily, for a time, you could
easily go to a cigarette vending machine and buy cigarettes,
even if you were too young to do so. This
is a health problem, this is also a social problem.
And the cigarette machines come before the soda machines. I
(31:33):
always imagine a Coca Cola machine or a Pepsi machine
when I think of vending machines. They didn't come around
until nineteen thirty seven.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Well, and especially since the coke vending machine. You know,
those are proprietary owned, not always, but like they'll be,
you know, owned and distributed by the Coca Cola company.
And so they serve also as fantastic advertising. It's a
massive lit up you know thing, the logo like at
the bus station or whatever. That's what they're designed to
do is to be like a beacon of the coke
(32:06):
company out in the world.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Yeah, and we obviously, as a three three Americans, three
Georgia boys, we have a bit of a bias toward
Coca Cola. We're gonna be honest about that, but we're not.
Speaker 2 (32:20):
It's better than pepsi. We're sorry. It just pepsi tastes weird,
is off. Oh my gosh. I like products, but pepsi
the cola is not good.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
Man. I got to tell you, it's a real cultural
divide here in the US. You know, you go too
far in one direction and all of a sudden you're
in pepsi country.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
I don't trust any place that only has pepsi products.
I'm drawing a line in this. Not even Pizza Hut
don't care for it. Wow, all right, well, choose your battles.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
I got your back, Coca Cola, regardless of whether you
love them or hate them. Coca Cola was the first
company to sell their bottled dream in vending machines, and
that I love that point about advertising because it's probably
a big part of their success. And now we get
(33:09):
to the early twinklings of World War Two. The US
begins building up its defense industry.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
And now you can buy handguns in vending machines. We're
heading in that direction, y'all as a country. Sorry not
to be political, but I could, I could see it.
It's like something that would be in idiocracy.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
Yeah, they'll probably put them in the coke or the
pepsi machines, like the pre existing machines. Do you want
a fanta or do you want.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
A firearm or a glock?
Speaker 1 (33:40):
Right, So, as the US enters into a wartime economy,
they have this tremendous boom in factories, right in industrialization,
in around the clock production of things that will be
useful in war.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
The people who are in.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Charge of these factories and these plants, they say, all right,
we can't have employees working for twelve plus hours without
a refreshment break, and we're not going to pay for
a full time cafeteria staff.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
So what about vending machines? Exactly. I really really love
the term automat because it just makes me think of
like the old school I believe it was Greek automatons,
you know, the automated man or whatever, And it's such
a nostalgic thing. I think it's maybe a cup opper
painting like Nighthawks at the Diner I think is one
(34:41):
where there's this classic, you know scene of like a
New York City automat, you know, where you have like
the little windows you put your money in and then
your pie is behind this little window with a metal handle.
It's just so charming to me. And now we're starting
to see stuff like that kind of come back into
popularity with like some of these like Revolt Thing sushi
restaurants that are so popular and fun.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Sure, yeah, or there are a lot of restaurants that
use these specific vending machines where you put in the money,
you put in your yen or whatever, and then you
select the thing you want to eat, and it doesn't
give you the thing. It gives you a ticket, and
you take the ticket to a counter or you you know,
(35:27):
you walk up to the counter and someone hands you
the food. It's a it's kind of a hybrid relationship
between vending machine and actual customer service. I love an automat.
It's just a cool vibe. And during the nineteen forties
and the nineteen fifties here in the US, vending machines
were largely concentrated in plants and in factories. This is
(35:51):
where you know, this is where you think of the
break room vending machine, right, if you've ever had one
of those, and they always they always had these lands
crackers of a certain age.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
Yeah. I always can judge, like whether a company is
going to be cool to work for by whether they
have like free snacks or a vending machine in the
break room. Having the vending machine just strikes me as
being so cheap, and that is not a company I
would wish to work for, sir.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
Yeah, having a vending machine for the employees like that
always strikes me as saying we don't especially love you,
but you know, no judgment.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
We have a little judgment, a little judgment. We're curious.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
Yeah, let's be accountable, a little bit of judgment because
we have had vending machines in our operation in the past,
and I think the statute has expired here so I
can tell you this. No, the whole reason we had
vending machines in the Buckhead office is because our office manager, Michael,
owned a vending machine company.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
You're joking. I remember Michael.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
Yeah, that was early days. He's doing well, he's doing well.
Speaker 2 (37:04):
I always liked him. I remember when I first met Mike,
because I guess he went by. We installed like this
in one of the weird offices that we were converting
into a podcast studio in the earliest days of podcasting. Literally,
we just there was this open window and the traffic
noise outside. It was like a high rise, you know,
upper floor building, and we just like took a bunch
(37:27):
of egg crape foam and like stapled it to plywood
and like shoved that in the window and like that
was Man, it was so punk rock back then poil
but still better than the glass. Oh yeah, it was
so so uh so old.
Speaker 1 (37:44):
Praise due to our our colleague and our friends, Mike Campbell.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
Moving into the vending machine industry is a naturally American
thing to do. America takes the idea of the vending
machine and for a while they run with it. We
could argue that now China and Japan have accelerated the
vending machine boom that the United States pursued. You know,
(38:13):
by the end of the nineteen fifties, there are vending
machines throughout the US and they're selling not just prepackaged food,
but they're selling freshly prepared stuff to your point about automats.
Now we see another innovation in the world of soft
drink vending machines, refrigeration. The refrigeration is a huge game
(38:38):
changer because I don't care know what people think about
pepsi or coke. I'm just not European enough to enjoy
it at room temperature.
Speaker 2 (38:49):
You know, I will house a d C at room
temperature with lemon time. No, no, no, d dyed coke.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
No, I mean with leon, because Europeans put lemon.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
That's a thing they drove O. I did not know that.
But I am headed to Europe next month, so maybe
I'll give that a try. Yeah, only if I'm really thirsty.
And for me, if it's bubbly, a bubbly drink, I
can drink at room temperature because in some weird way,
the bubbles are like a stand in for it being cold.
But drinking flat room temperature soda is akin to death.
(39:22):
It is just absolutely miserable.
Speaker 1 (39:24):
Oh yeah, yeah, no, no, it needs the effort vescence,
It needs the carbonations.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
Ben, we're talking about refrigeration.
Speaker 1 (39:31):
Yeah, yes, yes, we are, we are.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
They keep us on task.
Speaker 1 (39:34):
There there's another curious thing that has been missing from
the vending machine race for a long time. It's not
until the nineteen forties that coffee vending machines are developed.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
Cool. I mean all the moving parts in that, Like
someone had to figure out what how to automatically grind
the beans and then you know, you put the cup
in and then it makes you a perfect serving size.
You know, when I think of that, I'll tell you
what I think I've been is hospitals. Oh yeah, the
coffee vending machines, you really only in my mind. I
(40:09):
think you always see it in hospitals and courthouses.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
Yeah, hospitals, courthouses, I would add again auto body shops.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
Maybe usually auto body shops these days have like a
little free coffee like service kind.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Of see going back to our point about is the
stack free or do you have to pay for it?
Speaker 2 (40:28):
This is where you're paying with your time, that's.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
For sure, the only real currency. This is where we
get to something that we foreshadowed. We we have a
lot of stuff we want to get to. We may
not get to all of it, but you you plan
it a nice seed there. Earlier in the Achilles heel
of all vending machines is their ability to figure out
(40:53):
whether the money being put in there is actual money
or actual fax money.
Speaker 2 (40:59):
Shout out the lord. Well, call back to our buddy hero,
our ancient innovator the beginning of this whole story, and
you'll recall his holy Water venue machine. You just put
a coin on a slot and it like fell, and
the weight of it was what triggered the mechanism that
(41:20):
opened the valve that then squirted out the holy water.
That is a you know, to your point, ben about you,
you mentioned that maybe there was a way so you
could determine if money was counterfeit, because in those days
it would have had to be down to the exact
weight probably or a very close exact way, because they
certainly didn't have any way of visually. The whole point
was to not have a person there, and so they
(41:42):
didn't have any kind of scanning technology, which is what
we're about to get into. So his machine had to
be like really sensitively tuned. I would think where if
he wanted to make sure people weren't just throwing a
rock in there, you know, a flat rock, that it
had to have enough weight to it, or had to
be an exact enough weight, and me, maybe I'm giving
them too much credit. But that is sort of a
(42:02):
rudimentary way of thinking about maybe pre technology that could
scan ways of determining whether money was real. It would
have to be like, it would be the exact right circumference,
you know, and only then could it go down the slot,
you know, to get into the mechanism to trigger the
treat Think.
Speaker 1 (42:18):
Of all the think of all all the comic strips
and old cartoons of a little scampy deadnis the mints
type kids stringing putting, the putting a string around a
quarter and then dropping in the vending machine and getting
their thing and yoinking it out. That this is a
hidden history fact that you only get for listening through
(42:40):
uh the rest of the show. The reason that coins
in the United States have ridges on them, the quarter
and the dimes, it's because it's because they wanted to
prevent fraud in vending machines. An American quarter has one
(43:01):
hundred and nineteen ridges, dimes have one hundred and eighteen ridges.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
It's so cool the earliest forms of these they could
build a mechanism that could detect that because they certainly
didn't have any kind of you know, electronic scanning ability.
You know, we get a little further into still very rudimentary,
but a little more advanced technology when they started accepting dollars.
Dollar bills have I think they still are maybe it's
(43:27):
a QR code now or sorry, an RFID, but were
embedded with a piece of magnetic tape that had information
embedded on it. And these early machines that took a
buck could scan that to verify that it was in
fact an authentic dollar.
Speaker 1 (43:42):
Yeah, they were using it was similar to eight track technology.
Early vending machines had this magnetic tape head mechanism that
determined whether a single one dollar bill had the correct
amount of iron content. But the issue, Oh, that's.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
Say, I got it kind of wrong. I thought it
was it was detecting that that little strip that was
embedded inside. Maybe that was later. This is even cooler
and more rudimentary, So it was scanning for a certain
element in the dollar. That's insane.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, this, Uh, there's this arm race between you know,
the deadis medici or the deadis minicis UH and the
people who don't want to get ripped off with their
vending machines because later, uh, laser printers can use iron
laced ink to make counterfeit dollars in what we would
(44:38):
call an entirely unnecessary and ridiculous scam.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
Yeah that's true. Yeah, I got a wonder like the
are people actually profiting off of counterfeit money? It just
seems like that is a scam that is going to
catch up to you sooner than.
Speaker 1 (44:51):
Later, especially in an increasingly cashless society.
Speaker 2 (44:54):
Also true.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yeah, true.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
So starting in the nineteen nineties, we start to see
digital scanning technology. I guess you could call it maybe
an early form of low resolution, low pixel count digital photography. Yeah, yeah,
this is really cool, right.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
The device is looking for specific patterns, and if your
dollar doesn't have that pattern, it will not be accepted.
This is the real reason why crumply dollar bills often
don't work in a vending machine. I always thought I
always thought it was just because I hadn't been neat
(45:36):
enough with my folded Sorry.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
No, I mean I think that probably has something to
do with it, too, but it Yeah, if the image
is distorted like that because of all the different crumples,
then the scanner's not gonna be able to read it,
especially in an older machine.
Speaker 1 (45:50):
And of course we are coming to you live in
twenty twenty five from the threshold of the future.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
Of our live album. It's gonna be a double LP
Ridiculous History Live in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
Yeah, it's gonna be super relevant in twenty twenty eight.
We'll probably still be doing this show.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
Do you think so? I hope so. I'd like to
think so. I'd like to think so too. What do
you think, Max? Are you down?
Speaker 1 (46:16):
Do you want to hang out with us for a
few more years?
Speaker 3 (46:19):
So, however, refer to this show as I'm like, yeah,
we do two episodes a week with a classic every
week until the sun absorbs the earth.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
There you go, Yeah, you go, that's a good deadline.
I'm cool.
Speaker 3 (46:32):
I'm like, it's one of those things where it's like,
I don't know that. That's not means saying if I
want to or not. It's more just saying, oh wow, okay,
I am I'm your bound you are bound not to
be too pronancy.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
But I actually thought of you Max when I was
I was watching something earlier, and I am putting a
screenshot in the chat for later anyway, WHOA, I love you. No,
you're on the chat too, Okay, I'm look forward to
the secret. So, uh, so we're not going to spend
(47:05):
too much time on the future of vending machines. Please
know your cultural mileage may vary.
Speaker 2 (47:12):
Yeah, I mean for sure in term, I guess when
we're talking about the future, we're talking about the way
payment forms have changed and will change, you know. I mean,
I don't know if you've seen these, but I guess
you could call these vending machines and a lot of
gas stations. You'll see these crypto machines, right, Yeah, who
uses those? It seems like somebody pulled pulled a fast
(47:33):
one with that. I don't think it really took off.
Speaker 1 (47:36):
Okay, explain this to me because I've seen them, You
and I haven't talked about them.
Speaker 2 (47:40):
What are they really able to deposit and withdraw crypto
from the blockchain on them? Supposedly, but I've never seen
one in you literally ever, Like, why would you need that?
You do it all online. That's the whole point of crypto.
But anyway, sketchy, it's weird. Like I said, I think
someone pulled a fast one, had a little fly by
night operation. But what we are going to start seeing
(48:04):
is for vending machines to have more and more flexible
payment options like I do love most vending machines that
you see. Now you can do the Apple pay, tap
to pay, and that's just becoming increasingly a thing that
you're going to start seeing on everything, not to mention
vending machines that use ultra violet scanners to authenticate cash,
(48:24):
measuring the amount of glow that gets emitted. Genuine notes
contain fluorescent ink, so it's going to glow. It's almost
like the like a forensic way of looking for like
bodily fluids at a crime scene. But increasingly, as we
to your point, ben are becoming more and more and
more of a cashless society, even a cashless world, you're
going to start seeing machines like the way that cars
(48:46):
stopped having CD players or the way that laptops stopped
having disk drives.
Speaker 1 (48:51):
You know that's a good I don't know, those are
two really good comparisons for this. We are going to
see vending machines continue because they satisfy some basic human needs, right,
the number one being the need for food and water,
or something like food or something like water, or the
(49:14):
need for speed or the need for speed, and it's
all motivated by the vending machine. Manufacturer's need for greed.
Speaker 2 (49:24):
That's very good, Ben, that's very style. Well played, my friend. Well,
I think you mentioned this at the top or maybe
in a conversation we had off Mike, But you know,
you you are a fan of Japan. The country and
the country of Japan is and has long been considered
like since it's kind of I don't know, reinvention of itself,
you know, after it was sort of decimated by some
(49:46):
bombs that we drop, you know, just a hey beacon
of technology and innovation, and within that you're seeing some
really weird and innovative uses of vending machines, like think
claw machines as well a arcades. They've always been on
the cutting edge. Yeah, we didn't even talk about how
pinball machines kind of came into being around the same
(50:07):
time as the New York City kind of vending machine boom.
But Ben, Japan is known for having really interesting and
weird stuff in its vending machines, which are absolutely everywhere.
And I'm excited to go about a year, but you've
been a bunch of times. Can you set the scene,
like how common are these things are? They literally everywhere?
(50:30):
Are what is in them? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (50:32):
I cannot wait for you guys to go with me
on the next trip. We're going to have such a time,
and as long as we have a couple of coins,
we're never going to be thirsty.
Speaker 2 (50:47):
Or in need of socks. Right right.
Speaker 1 (50:49):
By far, the most common vending machines in urban areas
of Japan are beverage machines. They'll sell they'll sell coffee,
they'll sell soda, they'll sell something I still don't quite
understand named pakari sweat.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
I've seen that in the in the Asian markets and Asia. Yeah,
it gets it's an energy drink. No, sorry, it's a
sports drink like electrolyte kind of replenishr or whatever.
Speaker 1 (51:16):
That's also know, it's a weird one, but you know, again,
who are we to judge. I do have an interesting
conspiracy about vending machines in Japan. You don't see a
ton of machines selling prepackaged stacks, and that's because restaurants
are likewise ubiquitous, so you don't want to take money
(51:37):
from the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (51:38):
That's my idea.
Speaker 1 (51:39):
But I did earlier. I think it was, oh gosh,
it must have been February. I ran into a pizza
vending machine.
Speaker 2 (51:48):
Like hot pizza discike, it's like an entire pie or
a slice. Yeah, yeah, it made a pizza, It makes
it for you. So this is taking the automation aspect
of it to a hole, just wild.
Speaker 1 (51:59):
But that's not even you know, what we're setting up
here is when you and Max and I and maybe
you as well, ridiculous historians head back to Japan. Those
are the bare like, those are the low threshold of
weird vending machines. We've heard tell of vending machines for bugs.
I haven't seen that, but I believe it because there
(52:21):
are a lot of There are a lot of strange
vending machines.
Speaker 2 (52:26):
Have you heard of the Japanese used pante vending machine?
And bust? We had to mention it, right, tell us
a little well, you know, in Tokyo. I think, in particular,
there was a brief period of time and I don't know,
I just remember when it was reported or when I
(52:47):
first read about it, maybe in the early two thousands
or maybe even late nineties, where you could buy women's
used under garments from a vending machine to feed some
kind of you know, a fetish.
Speaker 1 (53:03):
Yeah, yeah, I've never personally seen those, and I think
you make a I think you make a good point
because because it was a story that was reported in
the West, it was very much a real thing. But
I don't know if they're around anymore.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
There's no article on tech nin tech tech in Asia.
All right, I'm trying to read the r tech in
asia dot com the death and digital records resurrection of
Japan's used pante vending machine. So yeah, it's definitely it
gets in the mix, but you know, let's get wholesome
with it. There's also like amazing venue machines that sell
(53:41):
kind of like the old coin op where you put
a stack of quarters in and turn a crank and
then you get a little toy inside a plastic bubble.
Those are everywhere in Japan. Yeah, with all kinds of stuff.
There are entire.
Speaker 1 (53:56):
Almost like twenty four hour laundromat area. You know, if
you've ever been to a place where you've got washers
and dryers and they're all automated, there's no staff there.
You just go in and you put your coins in,
you do your laundry. There are places like that in
Japan entirely.
Speaker 2 (54:14):
For gatchapon makes sense and say same as like claw
machine parlors, you.
Speaker 1 (54:19):
Know, yeah, yeah, just so just so we also.
Speaker 2 (54:22):
Sometimes there'll be a combination where they'll have like half
claw machines and half goatchapons. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, combination.
Speaker 1 (54:28):
Right, And there are also ramen vending machines. We talk ramen,
not just prepackaged ramen, right, yes, yeah, yeah, hot ready
to eat ramen. There are also food ticket machines. There
are weird not quite gambling things where you can put
in some money for a mystery prize and it could
(54:52):
be you know, it could be like a picture of
a musician, or it could be a Nintendo.
Speaker 2 (54:59):
Switch go yeah, like a like a blind box, you know. Yeah,
I've seen these vending machines or I guess they're kind
of considered a game where it's like this one giant glass,
you know, enclosure with a mass single massive stuffed animal
suspended by a little string and the game as you
put in, you know, it's going to be more of
(55:20):
a premium than the smaller item claw machines, and you
get the opportunity to like operate these scissors that like
will snip the string, and if you can sniff the string,
you get this one giant prize. The whole question of
like the investment of actual funds and the comparison to
how much the thing that you've won is actually worth
(55:43):
is a discussion under itself. But it is fun to
find places though, where it doesn't feel like the machines
are rigged. But Ben, we talked about used pante machines
and the kind of mythology of that. You're also going
to see things like adult item vending machines, though not
typically would be in the in the in the courtyard
of the public square, because they they're pretty if I'm
(56:06):
not mistaken, Ben Japan has a bit of a modesty still,
even with its forward facing advertisement. It's it's a little
bit wholesome. Right.
Speaker 1 (56:15):
Well, again, I would say it goes back to location. Yeah,
So back in the day, as we established earlier, there
was this realization that the best way to sell stamps
or to sell postcards is to put the machine at
a place where people need stamps and the postcards, and.
Speaker 2 (56:32):
The naughty machines are probably more likely to be in
like the naughty shops, yes, in the naughty districts, yes, right.
Speaker 1 (56:39):
Right right straight up Shinjuku. But we also know that
you can see. You can see the same struggle that
the US had with tobacco vending machines in Japan, you know,
like alcohol vending.
Speaker 2 (56:57):
Machines, sake machines, right, yeah, there, we don't have those here.
We don't. We don't all no alcohol venus. It's completely
illegal in the United States. Now.
Speaker 1 (57:07):
In Japan, there are still cigarette vending machines, but there's
a much more robust law about it. You have to
have an I D And a special card and also.
Speaker 2 (57:19):
Have to be scanned and validated by the way, yep, right,
big brother is watching you. Here's the thing. I think
we we have to wrap up.
Speaker 1 (57:28):
But I think the best idea we had so far
is a vending machine that sells vending machines.
Speaker 2 (57:38):
I'm writing that down, and within those are tinier vending machines.
Speaker 1 (57:43):
It's just vending machines all the way down. It's dolls, right,
And I can't I can't wait. I can't wait to
explore new parts of the world with you guys, and
to find the weirdest vending machines we can. Uh, what
what would you what would you love in a vending machine?
Speaker 2 (58:05):
Oh? I know I already, I know you too. Well.
Speaker 1 (58:07):
I know what vending machine you would love. You'd love
a synth vending machine.
Speaker 2 (58:11):
Yeah, and that's you know the thing about that is
like I've certainly been to shops that you can put
anything in a vending machine. And I've certainly seen in
some like boutiki type places, whether they be record stores
or music stores, they'll have a vending machine that they'll
have some fun little items inside, you know, where it's
like you can get like a little grab bag item
like of some weird local art or something like that,
(58:32):
And I just think that's so fun. But yeah, a
synth venning machine would be rad. Though I would hope
that it wouldn't just drop it, you know, into the
chasm for me to go. No, No, it needs to
build up before it drops the beat. How are you
handed to me by a little robot arm with fingerless
gloves on? Sure? Max?
Speaker 1 (58:51):
What about your vending machine? What's your dream vending machine?
Speaker 2 (58:54):
Oh? Man, dream vending machine?
Speaker 3 (58:56):
That is a good question. I I like, for years
ago up in coffee, but I'm caffeine free now because yeah.
Speaker 2 (59:03):
It's okay, we're still we can still be friends. I
don't know, I maybe tea.
Speaker 3 (59:10):
I'm getting really into tea. I was also thinking about
games venning machine, but then also we used to have
those and they sucked, So go on PlayStation storing in
my video games. So I know I would like a
vending machine that I could buy more versions of myself,
because that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (59:27):
We had in this world the Betrishka maxis. I love it. Yeah,
I like it. I dig it.
Speaker 1 (59:32):
Tell us what your dream vending machine would be. Visit
us on our Facebook page, Ridiculous Historians. Yes, we are
still working to get our social media platforms back.
Speaker 2 (59:44):
We've got a plan. We're gonna stick Max on. We've
been discussed Max. You weren't present at this meeting, but
we're sticking Max on the on the medic boys. I
get it straight. I handled back. I straight up told
this was weird.
Speaker 1 (59:58):
I know you got it and old, but I straight
up told our folks in marketing you have to burn
the village to save the village. And they let me
get away with saying that on a work call.
Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
Oh you know, what are they gonna do? Well?
Speaker 1 (01:00:11):
Hopefully they will join us in future episodes, and we
hope you do as well. Thank you so much for
tuning in. Ridiculous historians. Thank you as always to our
super producer mister Max Williams, as well as his biological
brother Alex Williams, a mad composer who word on the
street has has it that he just recently drifted through town.
Speaker 2 (01:00:34):
I'm actually going to see him this very evening. He's
coming over to the studio to do some be booping.
I'm excited. So he actually also composed and be booped
this very theme that you hear in your very ears.
Huge thanks to Christopher Hasiotis and Eve Jeff Coates here
in spirit.
Speaker 1 (01:00:51):
Big big thanks of course to aj Bahamas Jacobs and
you're right, You're right, Max. We we got to get
him back on the back together big things. Yeah, yeah,
we were all right. Big thanks to BADASSU, the Badass imperator,
Ben Thompson, Rachel Big Spinach Lance and I think Donald.
Speaker 2 (01:01:13):
Strickland from earlier in a regular Dude from time to time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:01:20):
Well, Jonathan is still a little heated with us folks
behind the curtain because he wrote an entire quister.
Speaker 2 (01:01:28):
Segment and we just did not do it when we
were in the Middle East. Well, I think it's a
he's got it in his back pocket for next time.
It means it went have to do as much prep.
Geez Ben, Thanks to you, this was a really fine conversation.
Speaker 1 (01:01:41):
And thanks to our research associate Jeff.
Speaker 2 (01:01:44):
Thanks to for the good conversational fodder. Good Jeff, thank
you very.
Speaker 1 (01:01:48):
Much, and thanks to everybody who has run into a
weird vending machine.
Speaker 2 (01:01:55):
Please post pictures. I want to see weird like the
anthropomorphic vending machines with arms and legs, come alive at
night and have a whole like inner life, you know,
like a toy story. But with any machines, we'll see
a nice tep folks. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
(01:02:16):
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History News
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Noel Brown
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