Sweet Nostalgia

The Best-Selling Burps in the World

by Karen Richman

The 5th-grade teacher bellowed, startling all the rest of us.

“Don’t burp out loud, Mr. Bloom,” she chided Jonathan Bloom who liked to elicit a reaction from classmates, especially with obnoxious burps. “Gentlemen don’t do that,” Mrs. Taylor continued as some of us lowered our heads and giggled. “You will never get anywhere in life, never make money, never be successful with that sort of behavior.”

Jonathan pretended to be wounded, but he was the class clown and did anything and everything to get a laugh. It’s been a long time since Jonathan made the kids giggle, but even longer since Earl Tupper gave his first burp and made millions, proving Mrs. Taylor very, very wrong.

There was no doubt about it. It was “in,” it was a best-seller, it worked, and it led to many women in America leaving their dirty dishes in the sink, their unmade beds unmade, and going out into the work world with a new sense of personal financial entitlement and freedom to have fun socializing while earning their own money.

It was Tupperware, that miraculous invention of New Englander Earl Silas Tupper who in 1946 developed plastic containers used in households to contain food and keep it airtight. What set Tupperware apart from manufacturers of other plastic containers was a patented “burping seal.” Earl had gotten the idea from the metal lids used on paint cans and designed a polyethylene bowl with an airtight water cover. He patented the Tupper seal just three years later in 1949. Consumers were instructed to just lift the lid a little to “burp” out some air, then push down to seal. The burp was just the beginning of a whole lot of naughty fun.

In the years that followed WWII, Tupper designed plastics for the consumer market, his first and most popular invention was what he called “the wonder bowl,” which House Beautiful Magazine called “fine art for 39 cents.” That was the original cost of the bowl that has endured, and today wonder bowl sets cost upwards of $69. depending upon size; however, the way it was constructed and what it did has not changed.

But having a party changed everything! At the time, Stanley Home Products, a cleaning products company had a new method of selling their merchandise directly to housewives. It was a way to buy from salespeople in the comfort of their own homes complemented by food, drink, and friends and not from a door-to-door salesman. One of Stanley’s salespeople, Brownie Wise, saw this as a great opportunity to sell Tupperware, so she recruited her own sales staff and formed “Patio Parties” selling Tupperware products. Rather than fight Wise, Earl Tupper hired her in 1951 as his general sales manager, and the parties became fun and profitable. She’d throw plastic across the room to show it didn’t break, she invented party games with prizes, and suddenly suburbia was peppered with Tupperware parties filled with white, middle-class mothers who stepped away from being housewives for a few hours and learned to make money. Tupperware salespeople had a strict dress code: skirts and stockings, while the customers who attended the parties and sipped tea or punch and ate cookies dressed in similar fashion. Eventually, the dress code faded, and partygoers wore jeans, drank wine, or enjoyed cocktails. Feminism had reached new heights and took the Tupperware party right along with it!

Suddenly, silly little living room parties evolved into big business. Brownie Wise and Earl Tupper parted ways seven years later not amicably, then Tupper sold the company to Rexall, a drug store chain. It has had other corporate ownership since. The company became publicly traded and thrives more on the global market in 100 countries than here in the States. Parties are not as prevalent as they once were, but Tupperware continues to enjoy strong sales showing up at craft shows, bazaars, and for the first time ever has partnered with a store – Target. And of course, Tupperware now has a very extensive website.

Dixie Longate, a drag queen from south Florida and brilliant Tupperware salesperson, developed a hysterical comedy show, took her business on the road, and toured from Atlanta to Australia, selling Tupperware all along the way.

Are there still Tupperware parties? Few and far between, but sometimes a group of Baby Boomers who want to go retro, contact a Tupperware lady, mix up a batch of martinis, call some friends, and before long, plastic is being flung all over the living room and someone’s making money with plenty of laughter and burping.

Just imagine if Earl Tupper had Mrs. Taylor as his 5th-grade teacher. If he followed her advice and didn’t burp in public he never would have made his life into a three billion dollar worldwide enterprise giving people permission to burp all they wanted in polite company.

I wonder what Jonathan Bloom is doing these days?

Earl Silas Tupper

Easy Wellness Rituals to Add to Your New Year

By Crystal Cobert Giddens, LE

Happy New Year! As a holistic esthetician, I’m often asked about wellness tips to help clients’ get their skin healthy and glowing. We often talk about double cleansing, temperature and humidity control, and the benefits of oils for your skin. Did you know that some of those same principles can help other areas of your body as well?

Here are a few of my favorite wellness rituals to try this year:

Ready to Get a Little Chilly?

I have done a lot of research lately on ice baths and hydrotherapies. Ice baths just sounded awful to me. There is strong evidence that there are significant mental and physical benefits to cold water swimming, showering and closely monitored therapies where you expose your body too low temperatures.

The benefits include: • Reducing cholesterol • Boosting the immune system • Reducing autoimmune inflammation • Easing pain and speeding recovery from sports injuries • Increasing insulin sensitivity while decreasing insulin concentrations • Better mental health and brain development

I’ve tried the Cryo type therapy and I can tell you that it helped my inflammation in my joints and my SKIN. I can also tell you that I didn’t like having my entire body enclosed in the super cold capsule. I found it difficult to breathe.

I like the cold shower method so far. I take my normal shower, with normal temperatures because I know hot water is drying to the skin. Then I slowly turn the water temperature down to a point where I don’t gasp, and then turn the hot water completely off and stand there as long as I can stand it.

Treat Your Scalp Like Your Treat Your Skin

How you care for your hair and the products you use can make a big difference in the appearance of your hair and the health of your scalp.

Did you know that as you get older, your scalp produces less oil? You may not need to shampoo as often, but you still need to take care of the skin on your head. You should thoroughly double shampoo your scalp and leave the shampoo off the ends of your hair. Your ends will get clean as your rinse.

Pay close attention to the ingredients in your hair products. Your scalp absorbs chemicals just like your skin on your body and face. One of my favorites is Kevin Murphy. Their products are like skincare, for your hair.

Just like excessive heat can damage and dry out the skin on your face and body, you can damage your scalp when you constantly heat style your hair. Take a break when possible and give your scalp and hair a rest.

Lastly, be aware of any bumps, flakiness or anything that feels rough to the touch. Your dermatologist will usually look at your scalp when you have your yearly skin scan. (If you haven’t scheduled one, and you’re over 40 years old…it’s time.)

Oil Pulling and Tongue Scraping

There is concrete evidence that there is a correlation between our oral health and our overall well-being. Maintaining a healthy oral microbiome is important for our teeth and gum health (just like our skin and our gut). Our mouths host over 600 species of bacteria. Some of this bacteria is really beneficial and helps to make up the microbiome in our mouths. The rest can be detrimental to our oral health and can cause issues like tooth decay, bad breath and bleeding gums.

One of the bacteria that causes tooth decay is streptococcus mutans, a type of microorganism in everyone’s mouth. Oil pulling helps reduce the amount of detrimental bacteria in the mouth. The process is actually fascinating: unicellular bacteria are “enclosed” by a lipid membrane which sticks to the lipid structure of the oil you use during this process. When you swish the oil around your mouth, these bacteria get detached from the soft tissues of your mouth, attach to the oil and eventually get expelled once you spit out the oil. This is very similar to how laundry detergent removes dirt molecules from clothes when they get washed.

Daily oil pulling will help eliminate the bad bacteria from your mouth, assisting in your body’s detoxification process. Oil pulling (along with

tongue scraping) helps to eliminate sulphur producing bacteria that thrive in the microscopic grooves on the tongue. Flushing out this type of bacteria helps to keep your breath fresh and clean.

Tongue scraping is an oral hygiene practice similar to brushing your tongue with a toothbrush but it’s much more effective. The benefits? Less gunk build up on your tongue, fresher breath and improved taste buds! Your food will actually taste better and you will notice a decrease in the need for excessive salt and other spices. I have had several clients tell me that it has also helped reduce their cravings for certain foods, especially those with lots of sugar.

I like to tongue scrape at night, after I have flossed (always floss BEFORE brushing). Rinse and swish well. Then brush, tongue scrape, rinse well, gargle and you’re done. Make sure to clean your tongue scraper every night after use and towel or air dry. The 2 best types are stainless steel and copper. You can order them online or find them in most wellness stores or natural food stores. Cryotherapy

Crystal Cobert Giddens FACES of Saratoga www.facesofsaratoga.com