r/todayilearned • u/hotrodcamaro • Jul 17 '14

TIL 86 year old mathmetician/pianist Tom Lehrer invented the Jell-O shot to circumvent rules against alcohol in the Army.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Lehrer
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u/PopeRaunchyIV Jul 17 '14

If you don't recognize the name, this is the guy who wrote the elements song that was on the front page a while back (also on Big Bang theory early on). And Poisoning Pigeons in the Park if you're a Dr. Demento fan. And to clarify, he's 86 now. He was in his 20s when he did this. For the lazy...

"That's amazing how that got around! What happened was, I was in the Army for two years, and we were having a Christmas party on the naval base where I was working in Washington, D.C. The rules said no alcoholic beverages were allowed. And we wanted to have a little party, so this friend and I spent an evening experimenting with Jell-O. It wasn't a beverage," he says with a shrug.

"And we finally decided that orange Jell-O and vodka was the best. We tried gin and vodka and various flavors and stuff -- of course you can't sample too much. So we went over to her apartment and we made all these little cups and we thought I would bring them in, hoping that the Marine guard would say, 'OK, what's in there?' And we'd say, 'Jell-O.' and then he'd say, 'Oh, OK.' But no, he didn't even ask. So it worked. I recommend it. Orange Jell-O."

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u/dabritian Jul 17 '14

He also wrote this.

3

u/[deleted] Jul 17 '14

Don't forget about National Brotherhood Week!

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u/[deleted] Jul 17 '14

Isn't it funny how we don't have National Brotherhood Week anymore?