LIFE: 30 dumb inventions

Thanks to the genius of my favorite KG (check out her blog here), I have been entertained by these “30 dumb inventions” presented by LIFE magazine. Here are a few of my favorites:

A nanny supervising a baby suspended in a wire cage attached to the outside of a high tenement block window. The cages were distributed to members of the Chelsea Baby Club in London who have no gardens, or qualms about putting a child in a box dangling over a busy street. Photo: Reg Speller/Getty Images Jun 23, 1937

This mechanical cat can meow ten times a minute and the eyes light up each time. The device for scaring rats and mice is from Japan and is powered by a two-watt motor. Photo: Keystone/Getty Images Sep 01, 1963

A woman adjusts her stocking by the light of the Goodyear’s illuminated tires. The tire is made from a single piece of synthetic rubber and is brightly lit by bulbs mounted inside the wheel rim. Photo: Douglas Miller/Getty Images Oct 16, 1961

Photo: Yale Joel/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images Jan 01, 1962

It was a bad idea then, it’s a bad idea now. Sorry, Kanye. Photo: FPG Jan 01, 1950

Inventor Hugo Gernsback with his T.V. Glasses. Photo: Alfred Eisenstaedt/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images Jan 01, 1963

Photo: Jacobsen/Getty Images Jan 01, 1955

American science fiction writer and founder of the Church of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard uses his Hubbard Electrometer to determine whether tomatoes experience pain, 1968. His work led him to the conclusion that tomatoes “scream when sliced.” In this photo: L. Ron Hubbard Photo: Evening Standard/Getty Images Jan 01, 1968