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DETERGENTS By adding surfactants-two-molecule, synthetic surface-active agents-to soap granules, Procter & Gamble created a washday miracle. Dreft was first, in 1933. The big gun, Tide, arrived in 1949.
DISPOSABLE DIAPER Oh, baby, what a convenience! Procter & Gamble's Pampers, born in 1961, were first used only for special occasions. Now the 95% of American parents who buy disposables will spend up to $2,100 a child to avoid washing diapers.
NYLON STOCKINGS Nylon was created in 1938 DuPont found the killer app in 1940 when the first nylon stockings went on sale. Women gladly paid $1.15 a pair, twice the price of silk stockings.
POLARTEC The fabric of the '90s, even though it was introduced in 1981. Made by Malden Mills, the synthetic fabric (some material is even made partly out of recycled plastic bottles) is light, cozy, rugged and water and wind resistant. First worn by serious outdoor athletes, it is now used in all kinds of clothing.
ZIPPER Invented in 1913 by Swedish immigrant Gideon Sundback at Universal Fastener Co. in Pennsylvania. B.F. Goodrich first used the word to refer to a fastener on a pair of its galoshes; it was not used in clothes until the 1930s. By 1941 zippers beat the pants off buttons in the Battle of the Fly.
SKATEBOARD California-no surprise-is the home of the skateboard. The sport, an orthopedist's best friend, took off in the 1970s after polyurethane wheels smoothed out the ride.
BAND-AID Johnson & Johnson sold $3 000 worth of handmade Band-Aids in 1921, the year it introduced them. A company cotton buyer, Earle Dickson, had created them at home for his accident-prone wife. He then convinced his boss that the strips had merit.
SOFT CONTACT LENSES Otto Wichterle, a Czech scientist, created the first soft contact lens in 1961, using an Erector set and a phonograph motor. Bausch & Lomb bought the rights to his process for a reported $3 million in 1966.
PROZAC Eli Lilly launched Prozac in 1988. It works by blocking serotonin rather than allowing it to be released from the brain. Though it was initially controversial, more than 35 million people have got a lift from it.
TYLENOL Brand name for acetaminophen, available in 1960. Like aspirin it reduces pain and fever. Unlike aspirin it will not irritate the gastric system.
ORAL CONTRACEPTIVE Gregory Pincus and two colleagues revolutionized sex by creating the first effective birth-control pill, Enovid-10, introduced in the U.S. in 1960 by Searle.
SNEAKERS While many people, including the 13th century Indians of the Amazon, can lay claim to inventing sneakers, what really launched the boom was the arrival in 1916 of Keds, shoes with canvas uppers and rubber soles made by the U.S. Rubber Co.
SARAN WRAP In 2000 Year Old Man, Mel Brooks tells Carl Reiner that "the greatest thing mankind ever devised, I think, in my humble opinion, is Saran Wrap." Why? Because "you can put a sandwich in it! You can look through it!...It's so good and cute." Dow Chemical introduced its revolutionary packaging material, which is durable, airtight, transparent and flexible, in 1953.