| Acting in the 1967 hit movie The Graduate, Walter | | | | down after a year or two. NASA forgot about it. |
| Brooke had no idea what he was on to when he | | | | A Swedish company closely associated with the |
| forced this nutty piece of advice on Dustin Hoffman: | | | | NASA memory foam project continued tinkering |
| Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just | | | | around with the polyurethane compound on their |
| one word. | | | | own and, after ten years of further research, |
| Benjamin: Yes, sir. | | | | produced a version that wouldn't break down over |
| Mr. McGuire: Are you listening? | | | | time. It was a spongy, gel-like plastic, whose |
| Benjamin: Yes, I am. | | | | composite open cells could deform under pressure, |
| Mr. McGuire: Plastics. | | | | redistribute the air pockets to neighboring cells, and |
| To Brooke's sincere astonishment, "plastics" took the | | | | return. The next generation of memory foam had |
| stock market by storm the very next year. The | | | | arrived. |
| success of plastic, with uses limited only by the | | | | Tempur-Pedic, now a widely known company, |
| imagination, became one of the most important | | | | started marketing the material to hospitals for |
| legacies of the 19th and 20th Centuries. If the | | | | mattress pads to decrease bedsore cases. Patients |
| Oscar-winning director Mike Nichols were ever to | | | | reported that these mattress pads markedly reduced |
| update his movie for a modern audience, Mr. McGuire | | | | pressure on joints while lying down, while at the |
| would have two new words for Benjamin: memory | | | | same time providing all the back support they |
| foam. | | | | needed. Riding the waves of these rave reviews in |
| Memory foam is a truly space age material. The | | | | the medical world, Tempur-Pedic introduced memory |
| United States National Aeronautics and Space | | | | foam to the general populace in the early 1990s. It |
| Administration developed the first generation of | | | | was very expensive at first, but soon other |
| memory foam in the 1970s. Memory foam behaved | | | | companies caught wind of memory foam's potential, |
| like a liquid and a solid at the same time. You could | | | | and now there are dozens and dozens of companies |
| press your hand into the surface of the material, and | | | | producing more and more memory foam products |
| when you lifted it away, you could see your | | | | for demanding consumers every day. Prices continue |
| handprint lingering in the material for a short while as | | | | to decline. |
| the material slowly resumed its original flat state. The | | | | Today, memory foam is most often used in |
| "memory" of your hand was strong at first, and then | | | | mattresses, mattress toppers, and pillows, but the |
| faded with time. Realizing the ability of this new | | | | versatile material is also used in pet beds, footwear, |
| material to both cushion and support, NASA intended | | | | positional sleep aids, office furniture, automobile seat |
| to use it in the space shuttle, as a way to take the | | | | padding, infant cribs and car seats, wheel chair |
| edge off the G-force impact on astronauts' bodies | | | | cushions, hip pads and padded sweatpants, computer |
| during lift-off. | | | | carrying cases, movie theater seating, pistol gloves, |
| The first generation of memory foam never got off | | | | ear plugs, tennis racquet handles, and more. |
| the ground. It was too brittle and tended to break | | | | What would you make with memory foam? |