164 Fun Facts About Cleaning

Evidence of soap-like materials being made goes back to around 2800 BC in which ancient civilisation?

Proto-soaps mixing fat and alkali turn up in Sumerian, Babylonian and Egyptian texts.

What is the name of the chemical reaction that turns fats and an alkali such as lye into soap?

Saponification is the reaction in which fats or oils are hydrolysed by an alkali such as lye (sodium hydroxide), yielding soap and glycerol.

Ivory soap's famous slogan, introduced in 1891, was what?

'It Floats!' was Ivory's 1891 slogan, trading on bars whipped with air so they bobbed in the bath; its other tagline claimed 99 and 44/100 percent pure.

Sunlight, launched by Lever Brothers in 1884, is described as the world's first what?

Sunlight was the world's first packaged, branded laundry soap, sold in wrapped tablets instead of cut from a slab; its profits built Port Sunlight, Lever's model village on the Wirral.

Persil, launched by Henkel in 1907, took its name from silicate and which bleaching agent?

Persil fuses PERborate and SILicate: sodium perborate released oxygen bleach in the wash, letting Henkel sell it in 1907 as the first 'self-acting' laundry detergent.

Procter & Gamble's Tide, introduced in 1946, is recognised as the world's first what?

Tide was the world's first heavy-duty synthetic detergent; P&G had cancelled the research as 'Project X', and chemist Dick Byerly kept working on it in secret.

Synthetic detergents were first developed in Germany in World War I due to a shortage of what?

The wartime blockade left Germany short of oils and fats for soap-making, so chemists built the first synthetic detergents from coal-tar derivatives instead; BASF's Nekal appeared in 1917.

Which chemist found in 1785 that chlorine could bleach fabric and discovered the first commercial bleach?

Claude Berthollet showed in 1785 that chlorine bleached cloth and produced the first commercial bleach, Eau de Javel, in 1789; Scheele had isolated chlorine itself in 1774.

The first commercial bleach was named 'Eau de Javel' after a borough near which city?

Javel was a village on the Seine just outside Paris, now part of the 15th arrondissement, where Berthollet's bleach was first made in 1789; Tennant's solid bleaching powder followed in 1799.

The brand name Clorox is a portmanteau of chlorine and which other ingredient?

Clorox blends 'chlorine' and 'sodium hydroxide', the two chemicals reacted to make its hypochlorite bleach; Annie Murray built demand by giving away sample bottles at the family grocery in Oakland.

Domestos bleach was first produced in 1929 by Wilfred Handley and sold door to door in which English city?

An early slogan claimed it 'kills 99% of all household germs'; Lever Brothers bought the company in 1961.

Lysol was introduced in 1889 by Gustav Raupenstrauch to help end an epidemic of which disease in Germany?

Gustav Raupenstrauch introduced Lysol, a cresol-and-soap disinfectant, in 1889 to help end a cholera epidemic in Germany; decades later it was also marketed, disturbingly, as a feminine-hygiene douche.

According to Procter & Gamble's backstory, Mr. Clean was a sailor in which service before he took up cleaning?

Procter & Gamble's backstory makes Mr. Clean a former US Navy sailor; the character debuted on TV in 1958 and goes by Meister Proper in Germany and Don Limpio in Spain.

Which odour-trapping molecule is the active ingredient in Febreze?

Febreze's active ingredient is cyclodextrin, a ring-shaped sugar molecule whose hollow core traps odour molecules; it went into test markets in 1996 and grew into one of P&G's billion-dollar brands.

Which British engineer built the horse-drawn 'Puffing Billy' in 1901 and may have coined 'vacuum cleaner'?

Hubert Cecil Booth parked 'Puffing Billy' in the street and ran hoses in through windows; he had tested suction by sucking through a handkerchief on a chair, and he also designed Ferris wheels.

James Murray Spangler, who patented the first portable electric vacuum in 1908, had what department-store job?

Spangler was the caretaker, or janitor, at a department store in Canton; asthmatic, he blamed his carpet sweeper and built a prototype from a fan motor, a soap box and one of his wife's pillowcases.

Spangler sold his patent to a local maker of what, whose name became Britain's verb for vacuuming?

William Hoover ran a leather-goods business making horse harnesses and saddles in North Canton; Spangler had given a machine to his cousin Susan Troxel Hoover, William's wife, which is how the family found out.

About how many prototypes did James Dyson build before launching the G-Force vacuum in 1983?

Dyson built 5,127 prototypes over about five years before the G-Force; the cyclone idea came from a sawmill's dust extractor, and his earlier invention was the Ballbarrow.

Where did James Dyson first launch his bagless cleaner after every UK manufacturer refused it?

It won a Japanese design prize in 1991; the Dual Cyclone later became the fastest-selling vacuum ever in the UK.

The Roomba robot vacuum was first introduced by iRobot in which year?

iRobot introduced the Roomba in September 2002, shortly after Electrolux's Trilobite reached shops; it sold its first million units within about two years.

Which company introduced the first domestic automatic washing machine in 1937?

Bendix Home Appliances introduced the first domestic automatic washer in 1937, a front-loader that had to be bolted to the floor; Hans Rosling later called the washing machine the Industrial Revolution's greatest invention.

Josephine Cochrane invented the first successful dishwasher in 1886 in which state?

Cochrane built her hand-cranked, water-pressure dishwasher in a shed behind her home in Shelbyville, Illinois, patenting it in 1886; her company later became part of KitchenAid, and she entered the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2006.

What was Josephine Cochrane's motivation for inventing the dishwasher?

She showed nine machines at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, where hotels and restaurants took notice.

Which German company made Europe's first electric domestic dishwasher in 1929?

Miele built Europe's first electric domestic dishwasher in 1929, three decades after its founding in 1899; the company had already sold its first washing machines in 1901.

Which solvent, known as 'perc', became the dominant dry-cleaning solvent from the 1950s?

Perchloroethylene, or 'perc', is a non-flammable chlorinated solvent that displaced petroleum-based cleaners from the 1950s; earlier cleaners had used gasoline and kerosene, with predictable fire risks.

The first laundromat opened on April 18, 1934, in which Texas city?

J. F. Cantrell opened the first 'Washateria' in Fort Worth on April 18, 1934, renting out four electric washers by the hour; older Texans kept the name, and in Britain they are launderettes.

Which element's ions, together with calcium, make tap water 'hard'?

Hard water carries dissolved calcium and magnesium ions picked up from limestone and dolomite; they react with soap to form scum and drop out as limescale when heated, and softeners swap them for sodium.

Brillo pads, patented in 1913, combine steel wool with what?

Brillo pads pair steel wool with soap, originally a separate cake sold with the pads; they were invented because new aluminium pans blackened easily, and the founders paid their lawyer, Milton Loeb, in shares.

Ettore Steccone named his single-blade window squeegee after which US political programme?

Steccone, an Italian-born window washer in Oakland, patented his single-blade 'New Deal' squeegee in 1936; its light brass handle and sharp rubber blade replaced the bulky two-blade 'Chicago squeegee'.

Ostrich-feather dusters were developed in 1903 in which city?

Missionary Harry S. Beckner devised the ostrich-feather duster in Johannesburg in 1903, binding feathers from South Africa's ostrich farms to a broom handle; earlier American dusters had used turkey feathers.

Which religious community invented the flat broom-corn broom and the broom vice?

Shaker brother Theodore Bates of Watervliet, New York, clamped round broom-corn bundles flat in a vice around 1798, giving a wider, more efficient sweep that the Shakers then sold widely.

The word 'mop', spelled 'mappe' in the 15th century, may derive from a Latin word meaning what?

'Mop' most likely comes from Latin 'mappa', a napkin or cloth, by way of 15th-century 'mappe'; Thomas W. Stewart's 1893 patent used springs and levers to grip the mop head.

The word 'janitor' comes from the Latin 'ianitor', meaning what?

A Latin 'ianitor' was a doorkeeper, from 'ianua', a door; the same root gives January, the month named for Janus, the two-faced god of doorways.

Some trace spring cleaning to 'khaneh tekani', a tradition before which new-year festival?

Khaneh tekani, 'shaking the house', is the Iranian custom of scrubbing every room before Nowruz, the Persian new year at the March equinox; another candidate is the Jewish clearing of leaven before Passover.

Marie Kondo's KonMari method tells you to keep only the possessions that do what?

Keep only what sparks joy: gather everything in one category at a time and keep just the things that 'spark joy'; Kondo spent five years as an attendant maiden at a Shinto shrine.

Which streaming service released Tidying Up with Marie Kondo in 2019, earning her an Emmy nomination?

Netflix's Tidying Up with Marie Kondo brought her a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Host; her 2011 book has been published in more than 30 countries.

In which year did an Act of Parliament finally stop the practice of sending 'climbing boys' up British chimneys?

The Chimney Sweepers Act 1875 made sweeps register with the police, who enforced the earlier bans; the death of 12-year-old George Brewster in a Fulbourn Hospital flue that February pushed Lord Shaftesbury's bill through.

How narrow could the hot flues climbed by Victorian chimney boys as young as four be?

Flues in Victorian houses could be as narrow as 9 by 9 inches, and boys as young as four were sent up them; German master sweeps, organised in guilds, never used climbing boys at all.

Cif, the cream cleaner launched in France in 1965, is sold under which name in Australia and New Zealand?

Australia and New Zealand kept the original Jif name after Britain switched from Jif to Cif in 2001 to align the brand across Europe; Unilever's cream cleaner had launched in France in 1965.

Which detergent brand did Procter & Gamble sell from 1933, mainly for baby clothes?

Dreft, launched in 1933, was P&G's first synthetic detergent, marketed for delicate fabrics and baby clothes; Henkel's Fewa had begun selling fatty-alcohol-sulphate detergents in Germany the year before.

Which German brand, headquartered in Winnenden, is best known for pressure washers?

Kärcher, founded by Alfred Kärcher in 1935, moved to Winnenden in 1939 for lack of space; its first hot-water pressure washer, the DS 350, followed in 1950.

Nicholas McKay's 1956 Lint Pic-Up was sold by a company he named Helmac after whom?

Helmac fused the name of McKay's wife Helen with his own surname; the Flint, Michigan firm's rollers were handed out free by Michael Moore on the promotional tour for Roger & Me.

Ultra-fine microfibres were pioneered in the 1960s by Miyoshi Okamoto at which Japanese company?

Miyoshi Okamoto developed the ultra-fine fibres at Toray Industries in the 1960s, and the firm's first hit was Ultrasuede in the 1970s; microfibre cleaning cloths were popularised in Sweden in the early 1990s.

Baking soda's older name, still seen in 19th-century recipes, is what?

Saleratus, from Latin 'sal aeratus' (aerated salt), was the 19th-century name for baking soda, earlier applied to potassium bicarbonate; Americans say baking soda, Britons and Australians bicarbonate of soda.

Which company introduced Ajax Powdered Cleanser in 1947?

Colgate-Palmolive launched Ajax Powdered Cleanser in 1947; the 1960s 'Stronger than dirt!' campaign with its White Knight made the brand famous.

What is the primary active ingredient in the canned Bar Keepers Friend scouring powder?

Bar Keepers Friend's active ingredient is oxalic acid, the compound that gives rhubarb leaves their bite; the powder has been made in Indianapolis since 1882.

What does the Bar Keepers Friend logo represent?

The product was originally sold to bars in Indianapolis.

Which catchphrase made the OxiClean pitchman a TV fixture?

Billy Mays opened every spot with a booming 'Hi, Billy Mays here!', becoming the bearded face of OxiClean and Kaboom on late-night TV.

Which fellow pitchman co-starred with Billy Mays in the Discovery series PitchMen?

Anthony Sullivan, the British-born pitchman who started with the Smart Mop, co-starred with Billy Mays in PitchMen (2009), a series that followed them vetting inventors' products.

Who ran the Bissell carpet-sweeper company from 1889 to 1919?

Anna Sutherland Bissell took over the Grand Rapids firm when her husband Melville died in 1889 and ran it until 1919, making her one of America's first female company heads.

Which mineral, hauled out of Death Valley, was sold for laundry as '20 Mule Team'?

Borax, sodium borate, was hauled out of Death Valley by the 20-mule wagon teams of the 1880s that gave the brand its name; it softens water and boosts detergents.

What is Bon Ami's early trademark slogan?

Bon Ami's trademark slogan 'Hasn't scratched yet!' refers to its newly hatched chick, which has yet to scratch for food, a boast that the feldspar powder was gentler than other scourers; Bon Ami is French for 'good friend'.

Airborne compounds of which element tarnish silver, forming the black layer polish removes?

Tarnish on silver is silver sulfide, formed when sulfur compounds in the air, and in eggs, onions and rubber, react with the metal; polish, or an aluminium-foil and baking-soda bath, strips it off.

On a garment care label, what does a plain circle symbol mean?

A plain circle on a care label means the garment can be dry cleaned, with a letter inside naming the solvent (P for perchloroethylene); a triangle covers bleaching, a square drying and an iron shape ironing.

The Automobile Laundry, considered the first US business to use the name 'car wash', opened in 1914 in which city?

The first US semi-automatic car wash also debuted in Detroit, in 1946.

Which carpet-cleaning method works a solution-soaked absorbent pad over the surface with a rotary machine?

Bonnet cleaning runs a rotary floor machine fitted with an absorbent pad, the bonnet, soaked in cleaning solution over the carpet, lifting soil from the top fibres; hotels use it for quick turnarounds.

A 1582 Tudor ordinance required chimneys to be swept how many times per year?

Soot is highly flammable.

Under what name is Cif sold in Canada?

Unilever sells Cif as Vim in Canada, keeping the old Vim scouring-powder name inherited from Lever Brothers; in Germany the same product is Viss.

Under what name was Clorox founded in 1913?

Five investors put in $100 each in 1913 to start the Electro-Alkaline Company, whose Oakland plant on San Francisco Bay made America's first commercial liquid bleach; the firm took the Clorox name in 1922.

Which lip balm brand is owned by Clorox?

Clorox bought Burt's Bees for about $925 million in 2007, adding it to a portfolio that includes Glad, Kingsford and Hidden Valley.

What is the rotating drum of a clothes dryer called?

The rotating drum is the tumbler, through which heated air is blown while paddles lift and drop the clothes; a non-rotating drying cabinet handles delicate fabrics instead.

Who invented the 'electric flatiron', patented in 1882?

Henry W. Seely of New York patented the 'electric flatiron' on 6 June 1882, heated by a carbon arc; practical electric irons waited for Earl Richardson's Hotpoint in 1905.

The Danshari decluttering method was introduced in 2009 by which author?

Hideko Yamashita, a Japanese clutter consultant, published Danshari in 2009; the name combines dan (refuse), sha (dispose) and ri (separate), concepts she adapted from yoga practice.

The word detergent comes from a Latin verb meaning what?

'Detergent' comes from Latin 'detergere', to wipe or polish off (de- plus tergere, to wipe); English adopted it in the 1600s for cleansing agents.

Under what name is Downy fabric softener sold in Europe?

P&G sells Downy as Lenor across Europe and in Japan; the softener had launched in the US in 1960, while Comfort is Unilever's rival brand.

What did Conrad Gaiser invent in 1969 to spare his wife trips to the laundry room?

Conrad J. Gaiser soaked cloth squares in softener so his wife could toss one into the dryer instead of catching the rinse cycle; he patented the dryer sheet in 1969 and licensed it to P&G, which launched Bounce in 1972.

Which synthetic fibre reacts poorly with water and should be dry cleaned if possible?

Rayon, a regenerated cellulose fibre, weakens and can shrink or distort when wet, so many rayon garments are labelled dry clean only; silk and acetate also benefit from dry cleaning.

Which Swedish entrepreneur founded Electrolux in 1919 and sold its vacuums door to door?

Axel Wenner-Gren founded Electrolux in 1919 by merging the Lux vacuum company with an electrical firm; his door-to-door salesmen built the brand across Europe, and he later endowed the Wenner-Gren Foundation for anthropology.

The name Febreze is a portmanteau of which two words?

Febreze fuses 'fabric' and 'breeze', a nod to its original use as a fabric-refreshing spray; in many non-English markets P&G sells it as Ambi Pur.

The Great Stink of 1858 led London to adopt whose sewer proposal?

Parliament rushed through funding for Joseph Bazalgette's intercepting sewers within weeks of the 1858 Great Stink; work on the outfall sewers lasted from 1859 to 1875.

The CDC recommends hand sanitizers with at least what percentage of alcohol?

The CDC advises sanitizers with at least 60% alcohol, the level needed to disrupt microbial membranes; sanitizer is less effective than soap and water against norovirus.

For how long does the CDC recommend scrubbing when washing hands with soap?

The CDC says to scrub for at least 20 seconds, about the time it takes to hum 'Happy Birthday' twice; drying matters too, since wet hands pick up and spread germs more easily.

Harpic toilet cleaner takes its name from which inventor?

Harpic takes the first syllables of HARry PICkup, the Englishman who devised the lavatory cleaner in the 1920s; the brand later passed to Reckitt.

Which Harpic advertising slogan shares its wording with a slang term for 'crazy'?

Harpic's slogan 'Cleans Round The Bend' played on the lavatory's U-bend and on 'round the bend', slang for crazy; which came first is disputed by etymologists.

On which network did Hoarders debut in August 2009?

Hoarders premiered on A&E on 17 August 2009, pairing each hoarder with a psychologist and a clean-up crew; it later spent a stint on sister network Lifetime before returning to A&E.

In which US state was the Hoover Company founded in 1908?

The Hoover Company was founded in 1908 in North Canton, Ohio, where William Hoover's family made leather harnesses; Maytag bought the company in 1989.

Whirlpool sold Hoover's North American business in 2007 to which company?

Whirlpool sold Hoover's North American business to Hong Kong's Techtronic Industries for $107 million in 2007; TTI also owns the Milwaukee power-tool brand and licenses Ryobi.

Which 1861 Victorian guide said the housekeeper is 'second in command in the house'?

Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management (1861) calls the housekeeper 'second in command in the house', the mistress's immediate representative, except where a house steward ranks above her.

In Victorian England and Wales, domestic service was the second-largest category of employment after what?

Victorian censuses ranked domestic service second only to agricultural work as an employer in England and Wales, and it was the largest single employer of women throughout the period.

Which two experts starred in Channel 4's How Clean Is Your House?

Kim Woodburn and Aggie MacKenzie fronted How Clean Is Your House? on Channel 4 from 2003 to 2009, swabbing filthy homes for lab tests before scrubbing them.

What colour is pure hydrogen peroxide?

Pure hydrogen peroxide is a very pale blue liquid, slightly more viscous than water; consumer solutions of 3-6% are so dilute that they look colourless.

What did Ignaz Semmelweis propose doctors wash their hands with in 1847?

Maternal mortality dropped from 18% to under 2%.

Semmelweis was nicknamed the saviour of whom?

Semmelweis was called the 'saviour of mothers' for cutting deaths from puerperal (childbed) fever in Vienna's maternity clinic; colleagues rejected his idea and he died in an asylum in 1865.

The name Ivory was inspired by a quote from which Bible book?

Harley Procter chose it in 1879.

Who developed the inexpensive white soap that became Ivory in 1879?

James Norris Gamble, a trained chemist and son of co-founder James Gamble, formulated the cheap white soap in 1878; his cousin Harley Procter named it Ivory and marketed it.

Joseph Lister introduced which substance as a steriliser at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary?

Lister began dressing wounds with carbolic acid, now called phenol, at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary in 1865, cutting deaths from post-operative infection; Listerine was later named in his honour.

Keep America Beautiful was founded in 1953 by the American Can Company and which glass maker?

Owens-Illinois Glass and the American Can Company set up Keep America Beautiful in 1953 as disposable packaging spread; critics call its focus on individual littering rather than producers greenwashing.

Kleenex was first marketed in 1924 as what?

Kleenex launched in 1924 as a disposable cold-cream remover and was repositioned as a throwaway handkerchief only after customers wrote in about using it for colds; the 'ex' tied it to Kotex.

Which company owns the Kleenex trademark?

Kimberly-Clark has owned Kleenex since introducing it in 1924, alongside Kotex and Huggies; the name became so generic that the company has long fought to keep it a trademark.

What is the most littered item in the world?

Cigarette butts top the list, with an estimated 4.5 trillion discarded every year.

By the 2020s, which compound was the active ingredient in most Lysol products?

Benzalkonium chloride, a quaternary ammonium disinfectant, became the active ingredient across most Lysol products, replacing the cresols of the original 1889 formula; the 'Power and Free' line used hydrogen peroxide instead.

Which chemical company makes the melamine resin foam used in Magic Eraser sponges?

BASF's Basotect melamine resin foam, originally sold as sound and heat insulation, is the material P&G buys for its Mr. Clean Magic Eraser sponges, launched in 2003.

Melamine foam lifts scuffs by acting as a microscopic version of what?

Melamine foam's strands are as hard as glass though the block feels soft, so it works like extremely fine sandpaper, abrading marks off the surface rather than dissolving them.

In which year was Marie Kondo named to the TIME 100 list?

TIME named Marie Kondo one of its 100 most influential people in 2015, the year after the English edition of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up became a bestseller; her Netflix show followed in 2019.

What was the title of the 2021 Netflix follow-up to Tidying Up?

Sparking Joy with Marie Kondo premiered on Netflix in August 2021, taking the method beyond homes to shops and community spaces; Kondo was born in Tokyo in 1984.

The Maytag Washing Machine Company started in 1893 making what?

Maytag began in Newton, Iowa, in 1893 making farm implements, notably a band-cutter and self-feeder attachment that made threshing safer; it added wooden-tub washers in 1907 to fill slack seasons.

Which company has owned Maytag since April 2006?

Whirlpool also owns KitchenAid and Amana.

Ecover, the Belgian eco-cleaning company, was founded in 1979 to make what kind of products?

Ecover began in Malle, Belgium, in 1979 with a phosphate-free washing powder, years before phosphate bans, because phosphates were feeding algal blooms; it bought San Francisco's Method Products in 2012.

What was Miele's first product line, sold under the Meteor brand?

Miele's first products in 1899 were cream separators and butter churns, joined in 1901 by wooden tub washing machines, all sold under the Meteor name; vacuum cleaners followed in 1927.

Which actor first portrayed Mr. Clean in live-action commercials in 1958?

Character actor House Peters Jr., a familiar face in Westerns, was the first live-action Mr. Clean in 1958, the year the bald, earringed mascot debuted on television.

What first name did a 1962 promotion give Mr. Clean?

A 1962 'Give Mr. Clean a First Name' contest produced 'Veritably', making his full name Veritably Clean; the promotion ran in newspapers and on television.

Cleaning influencer Mrs Hinch worked in what job before starting her Instagram account?

Sophie Hinchliffe was a hairdresser in Essex when she began posting cleaning videos in 2018; her followers, the 'Hinch Army', call themselves Hinchers.

What was the title of the cleanfluencer Sophie Hinchliffe's first book, published in April 2019?

Hinch Yourself Happy came out in April 2019 and sold about 160,000 copies in its first week; The Little Book of Lists (2019) and her memoir This Is Me (2020) followed.

A 'charwoman' takes her name from 'char', an old English word meaning what?

'Char' (also 'chare') meant a turn of work or odd job, the same root as 'chore', so a charwoman was hired by the job; the clipped 'char' for a cleaner dates from the 20th century.

Which company introduced OxiClean in 1997?

Orange Glo International, the Denver company behind Orange Glo and Kaboom, launched OxiClean in 1997 with Billy Mays as pitchman; Church & Dwight bought the firm in 2006.

Which active ingredient in OxiClean releases hydrogen peroxide in water?

Sodium percarbonate, a solid adduct of sodium carbonate and hydrogen peroxide, dissolves in water to release the peroxide behind OxiClean's oxygen-bleach action; the 'Oxi' in the name plays on oxygen.

Which paper company launched Sani-Towels, the first paper towels, in 1907?

Scott Paper of Philadelphia launched Sani-Towels in 1907, reputedly after a railcar of paper too thick for toilet rolls was perforated into towels; the company marketed them as essential to hygiene.

Pine-Sol was invented in 1929 by Harry A. Cole in which city?

Harry A. Cole, a chemist in Jackson, Mississippi, created Pine-Sol in 1929 from pine oil, plentiful in the state's forests; Clorox bought the brand in 1990.

Pledge furniture polish is sold under what name in France?

SC Johnson sells Pledge as Pliz in France and Pronto in Italy and Spain; in Argentina it is Blem.

In which US city was Procter & Gamble founded in 1837?

William Procter, a candlemaker, and James Gamble, a soapmaker, founded the firm in Cincinnati in 1837 at their father-in-law's urging; the city's pork-packing trade supplied fat for both crafts.

The 'Great Bath' of which ancient city is one of the earliest public baths?

The Great Bath at Mohenjo Daro, built around 2500 BC in the Indus Valley, is a watertight brick tank about 12 by 7 metres, roughly the size of a modest municipal pool.

Which kitchen staple dissolves limescale, which is mostly calcium carbonate?

Vinegar's acetic acid reacts with calcium carbonate limescale to give soluble calcium acetate, water and carbon dioxide, which is why soaking a kettle in vinegar clears its scale.

Engineer Joe Jones conceived the Roomba idea in 1989 while working at which lab?

Joe Jones was a staff engineer at MIT's AI laboratory in 1989 when he sketched a cheap cleaning robot; he later built the Roomba at iRobot, founded by MIT's Rodney Brooks, Colin Angle and Helen Greiner.

What did the S.O.S in S.O.S Soap Pads originally stand for?

A San Francisco aluminium-pan salesman named Cox invented the pads in 1917 as a giveaway to help sell his cookware; his wife proposed the name 'Save Our Saucepans'.

Why does the S.O.S brand omit the final period?

Removing it made the name unique.

Which palm wax from Brazil gives car and shoe polishes their hard shine?

Carnauba wax is scraped from the leaves of the Copernicia prunifera palm of north-eastern Brazil; the hardest natural wax, it gives car and shoe polishes their glassy shine.

Scrubbing Bubbles was originally sold under what name?

S.C. Johnson bought the line in 1997.

Which voice actor voiced the lead Scrubbing Bubble in 1970s commercials?

Paul Winchell, the ventriloquist better known as Tigger in Disney's Winnie the Pooh films, voiced the lead Scrubbing Bubble in the 1970s spots.

Seventh Generation is based in which US city?

Seventh Generation is headquartered in Burlington, Vermont, where it was founded in 1988; its name comes from the Great Law of the Iroquois, which asks leaders to weigh the seventh generation to come.

For roughly how much did Unilever buy Seventh Generation in 2016?

Unilever paid about $700 million for Seventh Generation in September 2016, adding the plant-based, phosphate-free brand to its portfolio.

Which kitchen utensil did ShamWow pitchman Vince Offer also sell?

Vince Offer followed the ShamWow with the Slap Chop food chopper in 2009 ('You're gonna love my nuts'), then a lint roller called the Schticky.

The Snuggle Bear puppet was created by which puppeteer?

Kermit Love, the puppet builder who made Big Bird and Mr. Snuffleupagus for Sesame Street, designed the Snuggle Bear for Lever Brothers' fabric-softener ads in the 1980s.

Which former Monkee said in 2006 that he was the voice of the Snuggle Bear?

Micky Dolenz said in a 2006 interview that he had voiced the Snuggle Bear for a time; Corinne Orr, the voice of Trixie in Speed Racer, was the original voice.

The term for long-running daytime serial dramas comes from radio sponsorship by which businesses?

Radio serials of the 1930s were bankrolled by soap manufacturers such as Procter & Gamble, whose Oxydol sponsored Ma Perkins from 1933, so critics dubbed them soap operas.

What is the chemical formula of sodium hypochlorite, the compound in household bleach?

Sodium hypochlorite is NaOCl, one sodium, one oxygen and one chlorine; its dilute solution has disinfected since Berthollet's Eau de Javel of the 1780s.

Mixing liquid bleach with acidic limescale removers dangerously liberates which toxic gas?

Acid converts the hypochlorite in bleach to chlorine gas, the agent used as a weapon at Ypres in 1915; bleach should never be mixed with acidic descalers or vinegar.

Ancient Olympic competitors bathed with sea sponges soaked in what?

The word comes from the Greek spongos.

Which Thai April festival begins with cleaning homes and Buddha images before its water fights?

Songkran, the Thai new year on 13-15 April, starts with scrubbing homes and washing Buddha images before the famous street water fights; the name comes from Sanskrit for 'passing into'.

Which novel mentions a 'leathern squilgee', an early squeegee?

Melville's Moby-Dick (1851) has the Pequod's crew scrubbing decks with a 'leathern squilgee', a squeegee; early squeegees cleaned ship decks before window cleaners took them up.

A pyrolytic self-cleaning oven chars residue to ash at roughly what temperature?

A pyrolytic cycle heats the oven to about 500 C, roughly twice normal roasting heat, so grease and sugar char to a fine ash that wipes away; the door locks until it cools.

The word 'surfactant', coined in 1950, blends which phrase?

'Surfactant' contracts 'surface-active agent', a molecule with a water-loving head and grease-loving tail that lowers surface tension; horse chestnuts and soap nuts contain natural surfactants called saponins.

What is the Japanese name for the big house-cleaning done in the last days of December?

Osoji, 'the big cleaning', is the Japanese custom of scrubbing homes, schools and temples in late December so the new year starts clean; it descends from the Edo-era susuharai soot-sweeping of 13 December.

Which Tide product, launched in 2012, drew poison-control warnings for its sweet-like look?

Tide Pods, launched in February 2012, drew poison-control warnings after toddlers mistook the bright, squishy capsules for sweets; the 2018 'Tide Pod Challenge' meme brought a fresh wave of warnings.

Toilet Duck's duck-shaped bottle was patented in 1980 by a company from which country?

Walter Düring of Düring AG in Dällikon, Switzerland, patented the angled duck-neck bottle in 1980 to squirt under the rim; in Germany the brand is WC-Ente, 'toilet duck'.

Toilet brushes were originally made of wood with bristles from which animal?

Early toilet brushes had wooden handles and pig-bristle heads; horse, ox, squirrel and badger hair were also used before plastic bristles took over in the 20th century.

Ancient Egyptian tooth powder from 5000 BC included powdered ashes of what?

The Egyptian recipe mixed powdered ashes of ox hooves with myrrh, burnt eggshells and pumice; Greeks and Romans later added crushed bones and oyster shells.

Unilever was formed in 1930 by merging Lever Brothers with which Dutch company?

Margarine Unie, itself a 1927 merger of Dutch margarine makers Jurgens and Van den Bergh, joined Lever Brothers in 1930 to form Unilever; both sides competed for the same palm and whale oils.

In New Zealand's Southland region a vacuum cleaner is sometimes called what?

It comes from the Electrolux brand.

Vanish toilet bowl cleaner was introduced in 1937 to compete with which older product?

Judson Dunaway of Dover, New Hampshire, launched Vanish in 1937 to take on Sani-Flush, the 1911 market leader; both used sodium bisulfate as the active ingredient.

Vim scouring powder, launched in 1904 by William Lever, was an offshoot of which soap?

Vim grew out of Monkey Brand, the scouring soap Lever acquired in 1899 when he bought its maker Benjamin Brooke & Co; the powder was made at Port Sunlight near Liverpool.

Vim detergent tablets sponsored which CBS sitcom in the 1960s?

Lever Brothers' Vim detergent tablets sponsored The Lucy Show, Lucille Ball's post-I Love Lucy sitcom that ran on CBS from 1962 to 1968.

Vinegar typically contains what percentage of acetic acid?

Vinegars run from about 4% to 18% acetic acid, with household white vinegar near 5% and pickling strengths higher; the name comes from Old French 'vin aigre', sour wine.

In what year was the first English patent in the washing machine category issued?

The first English patent filed under 'washing machines' dates from 1691; a drawing of a machine appeared in 1752, and electric washers were advertised as early as 1904.

Which washing-up liquid's jingle promised 'hands that do dishes can feel soft as your face'?

Fairy Liquid launched in Britain in 1960, and its 'hands that do dishes' jingle ran for decades; the green bottle with the baby logo became a national fixture.

Who is credited as inventor of the wet wipe, trademarking Wet-Nap in 1958?

Arthur Julius adapted a soap-portioning machine in a Manhattan loft to moisten and fold towelettes, trademarking Wet-Nap in 1958; Colonel Sanders ordered them for KFC in 1963.

What was the original 1911 name of the appliance giant Whirlpool?

Louis and Emory Upton founded the Upton Machine Company in St. Joseph, Michigan, in 1911 to build motor-driven wringer washers; it became Nineteen Hundred Corporation in 1929 and Whirlpool in 1950.

What colour was the original Windex?

Today it is commonly blue.

Which company has manufactured Windex since acquiring it in 1993?

S. C. Johnson bought Drackett's brands, including Windex, from Bristol-Myers Squibb in 1993; Drackett itself had sold to Bristol-Myers in 1965.

What is scrim used for in traditional window cleaning?

Chamois loosens the dirt first.

In what year was Woolite introduced?

Woolite launched in 1951 as a gentle wash for wool and delicates; Reckitt & Colman, later Reckitt Benckiser, bought it with the Boyle-Midway brands in 1990.

Which date did the UN designate as World Cleanup Day in 2023?

The UN General Assembly designated 20 September as World Cleanup Day in December 2023, first marked in 2024; the Let's Do It World movement had run the event on a September Saturday since 2018.

In which California city did Frank Zamboni develop the first ice resurfacer in 1949?

Frank Zamboni built his Model A resurfacer in 1949 at Paramount Iceland, the rink he had opened in Paramount, California, in 1940; the machine shaves, washes and re-floods the ice in one pass.

What does HEPA stand for on a vacuum cleaner filter?

HEPA stands for high-efficiency particulate air: a filter that traps at least 99.97% of particles of 0.3 microns, a standard rooted in 1940s Manhattan Project work on radioactive dust.

Which company's planned $1.7 billion takeover of iRobot collapsed in January 2024?

Amazon agreed to buy iRobot for about $1.7 billion in 2022 but walked away in January 2024 after EU regulators signalled they would block the deal; iRobot cut about a third of its staff the same day.

What do Britons call the cloth used to dry dishes after washing up?

A tea towel, originally a fine linen cloth 18th-century households used to dry their precious tea china, is the British name for the dish-drying cloth; Americans say dish towel.

Ammonia, the classic glass-cleaner ingredient, is a weak example of what kind of chemical?

Ammonia dissolved in water is a weak base, so it breaks down greasy films and evaporates without streaks, which is why it was the active ingredient in classic glass cleaners.

Which abrasive mineral goes into heavy-duty hand cleaners and toilet-ring scouring sticks?

Pumice is a frothy volcanic glass so full of gas bubbles that it floats; ground fine it scours without deep scratches, which is why it goes into heavy-duty hand soaps and scouring sticks.

What does a pH of 7 tell you about a cleaning solution?

A pH of 7 is neutral, the value of pure water; acids run below 7 and alkalis above, so pH-neutral cleaners are chosen for stone and wood that acids or alkalis would etch.

Which dishwashing liquid, launched in 1973, was used to clean oiled wildlife after the Exxon Valdez spill?

Dawn, launched by P&G in 1973, was used to wash oiled birds and otters after the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill and again after Deepwater Horizon in 2010.

According to the inventor's son, Formula 409 was named after what?

Morris D. Rouff invented it in 1957 as an industrial degreaser; the company instead claims it was the 409th compound tested.

Which soap brand's 1930s advertising popularised the abbreviation 'B.O.' for body odour?

Lever's Lifebuoy, a red carbolic soap launched in 1894, ran radio and print ads from the 1930s that boomed 'B.O.' in a foghorn voice, making the abbreviation part of everyday speech.

Which company introduced Comet scouring powder in 1956 before selling the brand in 2001?

Procter & Gamble introduced Comet in 1956 and sold it to Prestige Brands in 2001, keeping rights in Europe and the US professional market; KIK Custom Products took it on in 2018.

Which John Everett Millais painting of his grandson became a celebrated Victorian advertisement?

Millais's 1886 painting Bubbles, of his grandson watching a soap bubble, was bought by Pears' Thomas Barratt, who added a bar of Pears soap and ran it as an advertisement for decades.

Who invented Crystal Drano drain cleaner in 1923?

Harry Drackett launched Crystal Drano in 1923; its lye, sodium nitrate, salt and aluminium shards react with water to release heat and hydrogen that stir the mix, and the slogan ran 'Once in every week, Drano in every drain'.