Welcome back! Gather ’round Grandpa Jason for another story time. Asker, bring me my pipe and reading glasses and I’ll begin the story of Henry Rothson, the coupon pioneer.

Back in the late 1800’s, there was a man named Charles William Post, who founded Postum Cereal Co., or Post for short, in Battle Creek, Michigan. Incidentally, 11 years after Post was founded, a man named Will Keith Kellogg founded the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company, which was later renamed to Kellogg’s because the previous name wouldn’t fit on any of the envelopes they ordered. With the new competition brought on by Kellogg’s, Post needed an edge that would push people to buy his product over Kellogg’s. The idea of the coupon really helped tip the scales in Post’s favor. If people would buy Post cereal with the coupon at a discount, then they’d be more willing to buy it at full price when they realized Post was a superior cereal. Most records report that Post was the inventor of the coupon idea.

This is false. His case was simply the first case where the coupon was so widely used and successful. The real inventor of the coupon was a dentist named Henry Rothson in the 1850’s. Henry was found that his patients weren’t coming to his offices often enough, and due to poor hygiene habits in the 1800’s, their teeth were rotting and getting cavities far too often. He observed that this was due to a lack of wealth for most of his patients. He came up with the idea of giving each of his patients a slip of paper – a coupon – offering discounted services if the patient came back within 6 months for another checkup. At that time, he or she would receive another coupon, and so forth. The benefits of this ingenious system were twofold. First, his patients were keeping their teeth cleaner and healthier, which in turn made their bodies healthier. Second, this system made the cost of practicing dentistry go down drastically. The cost of cleaning and checking-up clean teeth was much less than fixing someone whose teeth were rotting out of their head. Henry’s offices raked in 150% more profit after introducing the coupon into his business practices.

Henry had a son, Jacob, who was hired by Post in 1908 as an accountant. He introduced his father’s ideas to C.W. Post, who implemented them with quite a bit of success.

Thanks for reading! Next time I’m going to discuss the origin of Santa Claus.

I just got back from 1408. It’s a psychological horror movie that does what’s advertised. It had my adrenaline pumping throughout most of the movie, unlike many other films in the genre. I would like to see it again – I’m pretty sure there are subtle bits of foreshadowing and symbolism that I didn’t pick up the first time <insert other hippie concepts from film class here>. But 1408 is not what this post is about.

This post is about copycat movies, and I’ll be damned if I didn’t have a thousand things to get off my chest about them. The longer I type rants like this, the less ranty I become. I don’t know why, but it’s happened to the last 3 postings. I write a little bit, then I just delete them cause usually I decide the argument is petty as all hell. I guess I’m not so much of a written ranter.

Anyway the gist of the post was copycat movies like Deep Impact & Armageddon and Madagascar & The Wild need to stop. We see what you’re doing, movie makers, and we don’t like it. Or something. Take some creativity pills. Or as I like to call it, acid. There were very few copycat movies in the 70s. Think about that for a minute before you steal someone else’s movie.

I rant much better in person, I swear.

I’m feeling terribly uninspired this week.

Now, for this week’s Tuesdays with Flannel I will be sharing the epic story of The Toledo War.

Before 1833, Ohio had already established itself as a state, and Michigan was growing in population. The ‘observed border’ (there was no *official* border because Michigan wasn’t a state) between them was established from inaccurate maps. The border was supposed to run from the south tip of Lake Michigan, directly west, but the line on the map was 8 miles too far north on the east and 5 miles too far north on the west. This 468 square mile “gray area” – known as the Toledo Strip – was the cause of this particular war.

When Michigan applied to become a state, the surveyors realized their mistake and the proposed area that was to become the State of Michigan included the Toledo Strip. Ohio didn’t want to give up the land, so Congressmen lobbied to prevent Michigan from becoming a state unless they gave up the land. The Toledo War began when the Ohio Governor turned the Toledo strip into a county named after himself – Lucas County – and appointed his own sheriff and judge. The governor of Michigan had enough, and sent troops down toward Ohio.

In the end, it turned out to be a silly war – a series of pissing contests, rather than actual battles. The only casualty of this war was when an Ohio native stabbed a Michigan sheriff in a bar fight. Eventually President Jackson stepped in and said, “Knock it off!” Even after the petty battle between Ohio and Michigan, Congress wouldn’t let Michigan become a state unless they gave up the Toledo Strip. Michigan set up a state government anyway.

In 1837, Michigan ended up becoming an official state. They gave up the Toledo strip, and they were given the western three quarters of the Upper Peninsula instead. That’s OK because the UP is awesome and Toledo is a shithole.