02x20 - Surviving the 70s

[bunniefuu]

[sign buzzing]
[gentle music]

- Did you know that
there was a time

when just getting into bed
could land you in hot water?

- A waterbed weighs
nearly one ton.

That's like having a
small car in your bedroom.

- You could puncture it

and all of a sudden
now you've got a flood.

It's all the dangers of water
delivered in your mattress.

- Or when your garden hose
hid a dirty little secret.

- I thought it was the
copper end of the hose,

the taste of the copper
coming in my mouth.

As it turns out, it was
the taste of poison.

- Do you remember the decade

when buying a new car could
really blow up in your face?

- It should have just been a
fender bender, but on contact.

- There seems to be something
about the culture of the '70s

where people were a
little fast and loose

with their own health.

- These are the
things we used to do.

For fun, for money, or
maybe out of boredom,

that we'll never see again.

Were they dangerous? Certainly.

Deadly? Occasionally.

But boy, wasn't it exciting.

[dramatic music]

[mysterious music]

- [Henry] If you were a kid in
the 1970s,

your bicycle was a
ticket to it all.

Transportation, liberation,

and on occasion,
hospitalization.

- By the time the
bicycles became big

its turn in the 19th century

all the way to just
about the 1960s,

it was just about transportation

to get you from
point A to point B.

Maybe you used them
on your paper route.

But then in 1965, a dude comes
along and changes everything.

- [Rutledge] Evel Knievel
is the greatest daredevil

to ever live.

- In the '60s and '70s,

I mean, he was like a
God walking amongst us.

- Evel Knievel.

- He's on magazines
and lunchboxes

and even has a toy
version of himself

that can jump over things.

- [Henry] But playing with an
action figure isn't enough.

Kids want in on the
action themselves.

- [Adam] Suddenly kids want
bikes that look more badass

with chopper handlebars and
really sick forks and frames.

Bicycle, motorcycle, who
cares? I'm Evel Knievel, baby.

- My generation is the one

that graduated from
those old school bikes,

belonged to my sisters,
to mine, which I wanted

that had the high
handle bar, banana seat,

gold and glittered.

- You can sort of lean
back into your banana seat

so you can like really sit
there, like really feel like,

you know, you're
on a motorcycle,

basically, you're that cool.

Put some sunglasses on you
and you're ready to rock.

- [Rutledge] Now the cool thing
about these bikes

is they're really
meant to have fun,

so, a lot of kids are
really trying to learn

how to pop them up
and do wheelies.

Some of them had a little
wheelie bar in the back.

- You pulled wheelies
with this thing.

You rolled down the
street on one wheel.

You could skid out.
You could do jumps.

You could do all the stuff

you were watching
Evel Knievel do.

- [Jason] This 1968 model, the
Stingray, this thing

was amazing.

A smaller front wheel
for maneuverability,

a five-speed gear shift
right on the frame,

and front and rear suspension,

which just made it perfect
for jumping things.

- [Adam] Kids wanted to jump
something that would

draw a crowd.

Okay, they don't have
a line of school buses

like Evel Knievel,

but you might have
a friend or two

that might be
willing to lay down.

- Kids being kids,

they're bringing stuff
out of the garage.

They're getting boards.
They're getting ramps.

- [Jason] You didn't have a
helmet,

you know knee pads
or shoulder pads.

You're jumping on
your little stunt bike

without anything at all.

It's just kids
versus the pavement.

- [Nicole] Parents are fully
behind

their children
copying Evel Knievel

who broke bones and
fractured himself and,

you know, just all of
this various injuries.

And they're like, yeah,

that sounds like something
we want our kids to be doing.

What do you need out of the
garage to help you do that?

- [Henry] Just how
supportive our parents?

Enough to call the local news.

In 1976,

one Indiana station makes
a kid's death-defying leap

their featured programming.

- [Reporter] 13-year-old Terry
"Evel Knievel" Bollinger,

who set aside today
to prove to all

he could jump over


- [Henry] The report
builds up every detail.

A rickety plywood ramp and


- He's nervous but
confident, right?

This is going to be the
coolest moment of his life.

- The big moment comes. He
is huffing, he's puffing.

He takes off.

Once Terry falls,
there's not like an adult

who rushes in and is like,
hey, are you okay, buddy?

They're all just
kind of like, huh.

Well, I guess he
didn't make it. Hmm.

What's for dinner?

- [Jason] Terry has no
helmet, no protection.

If someone did something
like this today,

there would be a lot
of people being sued.

- [Reporter] You hurt
yourself, did you?

- No.
- [Reporter] What happened?

- Maybe my arm.

- [Reporter] What happened?

- Couldn't get
going fast enough.

- What I love is the
reporter seems more concerned

about Terry's safety
than Terry's parents,

and she's already planning
a follow-up story.

- [Reporter] When you
going to try it again?

- Next Monday.
- [Reporter] Next Monday.

- That's good journalism.

- [Don] Throughout the 1970s,

it was something like


would end up in the ER

due to injuries from
failed bike stunts.

Concussions, broken
bones, lacerated livers.

- [Henry] But by
the end of the '70s,

the inspiration for so
many young daredevils

is losing his mojo.

- [Kavitha] You start to see the
decline of Evel Knievel's

popularity.

For one, the novelty of
it has kind of worn off,

but also he's older.

And throughout his career,

Evel Knievel has sustained
over 400 bone injuries.

- And then in 1980, Evel
Knievel, the all time great,

retires.

- [Rutledge] The whole extreme
jumping fad fades pretty

quickly, and partly because,

suddenly, safety was more
important to parents,

and then they started
actually parenting,

paying attention to their kids.

- Those bikes weren't
designed for stunts,

but in the 1970s,

you didn't have to
misuse a toy to get hurt.

Sometimes using it exactly as
it was intended was enough.

- [Kavitha] In 1977, "Star Wars"
mania hit the country.

It's the biggest thing around.

It's the highest
grossing film to date.

- Every single company on earth

is out there with their clones,

trying to harness that
"Star Wars" magic.

- [Adam] "Battlestar Galactica"
premieres on ABC in 1978,

and much like "Star Wars" with
the series, come the toys.

- [Austin] The line is so
popular.

It sells two million
toys spacecraft

in the 1978 Christmas season.

- [Henry] Turns out,
"Battlestar Galactica"

has a secret weapon to thank
for their huge Christmas sales.

- [Kid] Cylon Raider
m*ssile base, open.

Cylon Raider launch.

- [Adam] Four of the ships from
the "Battlestar Galactica" range

can launch projectiles
at each other.

No other space toy,
not from "Buck Rogers,"

not from "Star
Wars" can do that.

- [Jason] When you're a kid
playing at interstellar warfare,

there's nothing more frustrating

than firing a m*ssile
at your friend ship,

saying, oh, I got you.

And he's saying, no, you didn't.

But with real projectiles,
instead of just flashing lights,

there's no questioning.

You fire, you hit, you know.

- [Henry] But these
fake space battles

turn out to be real
life dangerous.

- [Austin] Compared to back
then, today's modern projectile

toys are neutered.

Either the darts are soft
or they don't go too far,

or the firing
mechanisms are weak,

or more than likely, all three.

- But the "Battlestar
Galactica" line

shoots these hard
plastic missiles

with the force of a
low-powered BB g*n.

- [Austin] It shoots them far
and fast and straight,

which sounds awesome
because it was,

but the force with the
small size of the missiles,

that's a big problem.

- They're really small.

They're only about an
inch, an inch and a half.

It's a choking hazard.

But at the time,
choking hazards,

we're not really
thinking about it.

We're just buying toys
for our kids that are fun.

- [Don] And to make matters
worse,

where you load the m*ssile
and where you fire it

are actually very
close together,

especially on the
Colonial Viper.

So, it was very easy to slip

and accidentally
fire that m*ssile

right down your own
throat, lodge there,

and it was very
hard to get it out.

- There are so many stories

of parents running to
the emergency room.

One kid had a half hour
surgery to get this out.

- [Henry] Despite
these incidents,

the Consumer Product
Safety Commission

doesn't order the toys recalled.

- That is what responsible
looks like in the 1970s.

However, the company
knows they have a problem,

so they voluntarily put
labels on the toys saying,

don't fire at your
face or mouth.

But, they don't put the labels

on the ones in the stores.

They just put them on
the ones in the factories

that are about to be shipped.

- [Rutledge] Sales are still
going strong through the

holiday season.

And then a couple
days after Christmas,

a kid actually chokes on a
m*ssile from a Cylon Raider.

And that's kind of it.

- [Austin] The fun is over.

They recall existing "Battlestar
Galactica" spaceships

and redesign new ones
with non-firing missiles.

It's such a big deal.

They actually highlight
it in the commercials.

- [Voiceover] Redesign toys
do not launch missiles.

- [Hakeem] Sales drop like
crazy.

Their biggest selling point

has become their
greatest liability.

They've become more safe, but
as far as kids are concerned,

they are a lot less cool.

- [Adam] It is the "Battlestar
Galactica" toy line

that is responsible

for toys that come with
small plastic pieces

bearing the warning
of choking hazards.

- [Jason] Unsurprisingly,
those dangerous

OG "Battlestar Galactica"
m*ssile firing ships,

they are now considered rare
and valuable collectibles.

- So there you go.

Those toys actually
ended up making us safer.

Chalk one up for the '70s.

- If you thought New York was
dangerous during the '70s,

the Big Apple had nothing
on a popular tourist spot

across the river in the
wilds of New Jersey.

- [Kavitha] Action Park will
always be remembered

as the most thrilling
and dangerous

and bonkers kids park
in the tri-state area.

Nothing compares to it.

- I can't wait to
jump into Tarzan pool.

- [Austin] I would've loved to
go on all of the Action Park

rides that are so notorious
and dangerous.

Like I want to
get bounced around

in a misengineered loopty loop.

I want to lose my
teeth on a rope swing.

Action Park commercials were
the coolest thing on earth.

- [Don] I grew up in Jersey and
I remember the radio ads.

Come to Action Park. It sounded
like a crazy thing to do.

Like you could risk your
life down a mountain

and you wanted to go.

It sounded like the
ultimate adventure.

- [Henry] How did
Action Park become known

as the place for
death-defying rides?

It all began with the
very first attraction

when there was no park,
just a struggling ski slope.

- It's 1976 and businessman
Gene Mulvihill is in a bind.

He used to work on Wall Street,

but he got chased out by the
SEC for breaking so many rules.

Now, he is the owner of
a big risky investment

called the Vernon Valley
Great Gorge Ski Resort

in New Jersey.

And he's bleeding money.

He can't use the ski
resort in the summer months

because there's no snow,

but he comes up with a plan to
use his land all year round.

- He comes up with
a bobsled type run,

a 2,700-foot twisting chute

made of the cheapest
concrete you could find.

- [Don] The bobsled would be a
simple plastic seat on rollers.

A stick between your legs
would be there to apply brakes

if you went too fast.

Maybe.

- [Henry] It's called
an alpine slide.

A ride that's becoming popular

at ski areas around the world.

But this one is going
to be unlike any other.

- [Austin] Typical alpine slides
have a more gradual slope.

Mulvihill is going to plummet
almost 1,000 vertical feet

in less than one minute.

- [Hakeem] You fly down the
mountain in your own little

vehicle, whipping around turns,
winding, twisting.

It is pure exhilaration.

- [Henry] The ride
is so popular.

Mulvihill builds
Action Park around it,

attracting over a million
visitors every year.

- My kids love the ride.

- [Henry] But the alpine slide

remains its most
popular attraction

and its most perilous.

- I grew up around Action Park.

I had a t-shirt that had
the alpine slide on it.

However, I never actually
went on the Alpine Slide

because it was famous for
people getting hurt on it.

- [Hakeem] There are so many
problems starting with

the handbrake.

First off, it's
just a wooden stick.

And they're so
poorly maintained,

it doesn't always work.

- There's also the issue
that the walls of the chute

are only about a foot high.

So if anything happens,

you go completely flying
off of this apparatus

at 40 miles an hour.

- [Brian] People would get
hurt. It would flip.

People would get thrown out of
it. I saw all this firsthand.

- [Hakeem] Instead of the thrill
of skiing without snow,

the alpine slide becomes
the thrill of surgery

without anesthesia.

- It looks cool and super fun,
but injuries keep piling up.

- There's a 19-year-old
employee of the facility

who gets onto one of the
sleds with a faulty brake.

It fails. He goes flying.

His head hits a rock and
he falls into a coma.

- [Don] The family sues
Action Park and wins,

but somehow the place keeps
operating for another 16 years.

- [Henry] The place is
earning its nicknames

like accident park, traction
park, and class action park.

But nothing seems to be
enough to earn it a shut down.

- [Kavitha] Finally, by the mid


Mulvihill has encountered
all of these lawsuits

and he's in debt,

so, he's finally forced
to shut down Action Park.

And then it's converted
to a real water park

with actual safety
features and guidelines.

- If the Alpine slide
wasn't terrifying enough,

you could always take a ride

in one of the most
notorious cars in history.

- [Jason] By the late '60s,
American car manufacturers,

they're really
starting to worry.

Gas prices are going up.

They're losing a
generation of consumers

to these smaller foreign cars.

But Ford, all they're
offering right now,

are these heavy muscle cars,

and so they come
up with a solution.

- [Don] In 1970, after
two years of R&D,

when it normally takes
twice as much time

to develop a new car,

Ford rolls out a new model

unlike anything they've
ever made before.

- [Voiceover] Pinto, the new
world carefree car from Ford.

- [Jason] The Pinto is here to
save Ford from the invasive

VW bug.

It's marketed as a low cost,
low fuel, American-made car.

Everything about the Pinto

is designed to be
easy on the wallet.

- [Nicole] Ford does a crazy
amount of promoting for the

Pinto, they've got it in TV ads.

Henry Ford II

is driving it around
everywhere through Detroit.

Really, really building a brand.

- [Jason] This thing also is
only half the weight

of their normal cars,

which means it's going to
get better gas mileage.

It's also very affordable.

It's $2,000 brand new,

which is about $16,000
in today's money.

- [Henry] The affordable,
fuel-efficient Pinto

is the perfect car
for the early '70s,

and 800,000 are sold
in the first two years.

- [Don] In 1973, due to
the oil crisis,

gas prices in America
quadruple overnight,

and as a result, sales
of Pintos skyrocket.

- [Henry] But the plucky Pinto
also has a hot little secret.

- Lily Gray is driving
her Pinto in May of 1972,

and it kind of stalls out.

So she's trying to get out
of the way and is rear-ended,

and her car burst into flames.

- It should have just been a
fender bender, but on contact.

Boom.

- This is actually the
first of many incidents

involving Pintos
getting hit from behind

in low speed impacts

and bursting into
flame like blowtorches.

So people are thinking,
what's going on?

Something's not right here.

- [Negin] It turns out

because they wanted to make
the car small and light,

during the design phase,

the rear of the Pinto shrunk
to far more than what's normal.

Shrinking any part of a car
should be really done with care.

- [Brian] The problem is the gas
tank

was right next to
the back bumper

with almost no protection.

- [Jason] So, even in a fender
bender,

sharp metal points rip the gas
tank open like a can opener.

Fuel spills everywhere.

One spark, and it's
like the 4th of July.

- [Henry] By the late 1970s,

over a hundred
lawsuits are filed

by victims of fiery
Pinto crashes.

- [Negin] News story after news
story

about these explosions come out,

and it becomes a
national punchline.

It's in late night.
It's in cartoons.

- It was kind of one
of the first examples

that I remember of
a nationwide joke.

But, for something to gain

that level of notoriety and
failure, it had to really suck.

It became the standard
bearer for what a flop was.

- [Jason] In 1978, 1.5 million
Pintos are actually recalled.

Crazy thing is like 1979, 1980,

they still sell
almost 200,000 Pintos,

which goes to show you
people are willing to

maybe compromise on safety
if they can save a buck.

- Once the '70s went
away, so did the Pinto.

It was discontinued in 1980.

- Nothing embodies the
free-wheeling 1970s,

more than pairing a huge crowd
with extremely cheap beer.

Surely, that wouldn't
lead to any trouble.

- [Nicole] In 1974, it's a hard
time for baseball.

One of the top teams,
the Milwaukee Brewers,

is getting less than


- [Jason] The Oakland A's,

they're the reigning
world series champions.

They got Reggie
Jackson on their team,

and they can't sell


If the very best teams
can't fill their stadiums,

then a team that's not even
doing very well at all,

like the Cleveland Indians,

they're going to have a
lot of leftover hotdogs

at the end of a game.

- [Henry] Hoping to draw a
crowd, Cleveland's front office

comes up with an innovative
marketing ploy to boost revenue.

- 10 cent beer night.

- [Nicole] Offer people cheap
beer, get people in the stands,

and they feel like it's
going to be a home run.

To their surprise, 25,000 fans
show up for this promotion.

- And they start drinking


- The trouble is evident as
early as the second inning.

When a woman jumps onto
the field, runs out,

lifts her shirt, exposing her
breasts to the crowd,

and then tries to kiss
the home plate umpire.

Soon after that, a young man
starts peeling off his clothes

and streaks completely
across the outfield.

- [Henry] Streakers on the
field? That's bad enough.

But, the home team is behind.

And in the stands, the
crowd is going wild.

- The beer vendors,
they're so overwhelmed,

they abandon their
posts altogether.

The kegs are now unattended,

so people are able to just
pour as much beer as they want.

- [Nicole] Can you imagine to
date you have security guards,

you have people
IDing for drinks.

Back then, people were
ransacking the place.

- [Henry] At the end
of the ninth inning

with the beer flowing freely
and the score tied up,

the Indians are on the
verge of a comeback win.

And the event turns into
absolute pandemonium.

- The crowd gets
rowdier and rowdier.

They start throwing
beer bottles.

They start throwing trash
onto the field, batteries.

- [Jason] They start
throwing firecrackers

into the opposing team's
bullpen, the Texas Rangers.

And they start yelling
back up into the stands.

The fans start yelling
back down to them.

People start storming
the field by the hundreds.

People are starting
fights with the players.

Everybody's out of control.

- [Henry] 50 stadium officers

and two off-duty
Cleveland policemen

are completely overwhelmed
by the mob of drunk fans

and have to call for assistance.

- It was just so unsafe.

Eventually, the
players were like,

well, we got to
defend ourselves.

- [Jason] Billy Martin, the
manager of the Texas rangers,

he tells his
players to grab bats

and go start walloping
these drunk fans.

- [Edward] When I saw a ten cent
beer night on the news,

it looked more like
what I imagined

the Roman Coliseum was like

than a placid day at the
park with the family.

- [Henry] With only one out to
go and the score still tied,

Umpire Nestor Chylak finally
has enough of the chaos

and calls the game a forfeit.

- I just think it was a,

just a bunch of kids who just
couldn't handle their liquor.

And those aren't the real good
baseball fans in Cleveland.

- [Brian] 10 cent beer night
is a perfect example

of how we're our
own worst enemy.

We took our shirts off.
We ran on the field.

We started a riot.

We can't be trusted
with 10 cent beers.

- It wasn't just sports crowds
that were wilder in the '70s.

Any big event could
get out of hand

when people showed up not
quite dressed for the occasion.

- [Kavitha] In 1973, the full
counterculture is in effect.

This is a generation

that is sick of the rigid
rules of their parents

and especially of the boomer
and World w*r II generation.

- [Negin] The motto was let
it all hang out.

And that's when a group of
college kids was just like,

oh, let's literally
have it all hang out.

- The way they do this,
especially on college campus,

is to strip down naked and
run around the grounds,

and they call this streaking.

- Streaking, it's fun because
it's transgressive, you know?

And, but it's also
harmless in a way.

But, it does feel dangerous
and it does feel freeing.

- It's not really clear

where the origins of
streaking on campus are.

By 1974, kids are
streaking across campuses

all over the country.

- [Brian] These fraternities
and sororities

that are letting people know

that they're going
to streak the quad.

Word gets out and people
start coming to the quad

to watch the show.

- [Henry] What starts is
a naked fraternity prank

becomes a movement, and soon
people gather by the thousands

to watch people get
their streak on.

- [Lance] Things just get out of
hand.

In North Carolina,


At SMU, more people show
up to watch the streakers

than the basketball game.

- In the 1970s, streaking
has kind of gone mainstream.

You have things
like Time Magazine

calling it the
epidermis epidemic.

- That spring, a streaker
runs by at the Academy Awards.

Actor David Niven is on stage.

- Quite likely.

Probably the only love that
man will ever get in his life

is by stripping off and
showing his shortcomings.

- [Henry] But the
carefree days don't last.

And believe it or not,

it's not the nakedness
that ends the party,

it's crowd control.

- 4,000 people turn out at
the University of Delaware

as spectators to
a streaking event,

and that just
turned into mayhem.

- [Lance] It ends with injured
police, damaged police cars,

and a dozen arrests.

- [Negin] Things get so bad that
the police start showing up

with riot gear at
these streaking events.

- Streaking eventually dies
down by the end of 1974

because of this mix
of police crackdowns

and universities
trying to stop it.

And just the thrill
of it kind of wanes.

- Today, streaking is
a thing of the past.

But those naked images,
they're forever.

- Hearing that people were
injecting something unusual

in the 1970s probably
won't shock you.

But, hearing what
it was just might.

- Back in the 1970s,
if you had allergies,

you would be treated
with an antihistamine,

but they caused drowsiness.

The type of drowsiness that
would put you out of action.

- [Rutledge] So, people start
looking for alternatives,

but what they find isn't
sold in drugstores.

It's urine.

Dr. George R. Burrell

runs the allergy
control medical clinics.

They're based in
Southern California

and they're working on something
called autoimmune therapy.

- Don't worry, patients
are not drinking the urine.

Dr. Burrell has a better idea.

- [Martin] You don't drink
liquids for 12 hours.

You're then exposed
to an allergen.

You then provide a urine sample.

The urine sample is
taken by the clinic

and it's put
through a centrifuge

and then injected
back into your body.

- That's right. You get
injected with your own pee.

- [Rutledge] I mean, my first
thought

is that someone had had a
little too much to drink

and they were like, you know,
I bet your pee could heal you.

And they're like,
you wouldn't dare.

- You would think with all
of the ridiculous cure-alls

we've had throughout
human history,

we'd be done with that.

But, it just keeps happening.

- [Rutledge] The theory is that
the antibodies created inside

you when you were subjected
to your allergens

is basically then
resubmitted into your body.

So, it's almost like your
own little mini vaccine

to help you fight
those allergies

and over time overcome them.

When you say it
out loud, you go,

oh, that kind of makes sense.

But then when you
think about it,

you're like, so my
pee will cure me?

That's a tough sell.

- [Henry] Although
unconventional,

it seems to work.

- [Martin] Newspapers began
running testimonials

and they're singing its praises.

It has helped with
their hay fever,

their asthma, their eczema.

It has even relieved headaches,

and they make it sound
like urine therapy

is the best thing ever.

- [Henry] It would be
great if your own waste

could become your own cure,
but it's a cure with a catch.

- There are so many problems

with injecting your own
urine back into your body.

- [Kavitha] Urine is what your
body has already decided to get

rid of.

It contains urea and ammonia

and just all kinds of
concentrated waste products.

Injecting it back into the body

forces your kidneys to
filter it all over again,

leading to dehydration
and kidney stress.

- [J Mack] In 1976, a committee
of doctors investigate this

clinic and they find no evidence

that these treatments
actually work.

- [Kavitha] There seems to be
something about the culture

of the '70s where people were a
little fast and loose

with their own health.

- Injecting pee may
have been bad for you,

but surely a nice cool
drink of water on a hot day

was perfectly safe, right?

Not in the '70s.

- [Austin] In the days before
video games and cell phones,

do you know what kids did
to entertain themselves?

They went outside.

- [Jason] You're outside
playing. It's a hot summer day.

You would just refresh
yourself with the garden hose.

- [Brian] Drinking from the
hose is a core memory.

For people of my
generation, it was it, man.

You were punished for
going inside your house,

and that would be chores
or some other nonsense.

- If you went inside,

there was always the chance
your parents would tell you

you weren't allowed to play
with your friends anymore.

So, drinking out of a hose
was a way to get a drink

without having to
risk going inside

and having mom tell you to stop.

- [Jason] You can still taste
it.

You crank the spigot, you
lift it up to your lips,

and you got that first
sip and it was off.

It didn't taste right.

But, you know what?

You drank it anyway and you
went right back to playing.

- [Henry] Turns out that
strange taste isn't the water,

it's your hose.

- [Martin] In late 1941, the
Japanese military

pushes toward the
Dutch East Indies,

and the United States is
cut off, almost entirely,

from rubber.

- [Dan] They had to come up
with a synthetic version.

This was called the
Emergency Rubber Project.

- [Martin] What this project
produces

is a synthetic
alternative to rubber.

The only problem is that

what makes this material
malleable is lead.

- [Dan] After the w*r, this
rubber substitute,

which is called PVC,

becomes this universal material

that's used in all kinds of
things, including garden hoses.

And when one of these synthetic
hoses sits out in the sun

for days or weeks or whole
summers on end, they break down.

And those chemicals
that are in the PVC

leach into the water
that's inside the hose.

- It's more than just
a disgusting flavor.

This hose water contains

up to 100 times the
safe level of lead.

So, you're actually ingesting

the stuff that goes
into literal b*ll*ts.

- [Rebecca] Lead is a
neurotoxin. In other words, it

destroys neurons.

And you actually can have
not just cognitive defect,

you can lose your
mind effectively

because of chronic exposure
to lead in small amounts.

- I though it was the
copper end of the hose,

the taste of the copper
coming in my mouth.

As it turns out, it was
the taste of poison.

- [Henry] After a series of
damning consumer reports,

hose manufacturers finally
upgrade their formula.

- [Austin] It's kind of too
little, too late.

By the early 2000s,
consumers are,

one, wary of their
municipal water,

and two, more likely
to buy bottled water.

On top of that,

kids are more likely to
be playing video games

or chatting with
their friends indoors.

Drinking from the
hose is sort of over,

and it's sort of sad.

- [Brian] I wouldn't go back in
time and not drink from the

hose, I think I gained more

from being outside drinking
from the hose than I lost

with whatever health problems
I'm going to develop.

- Maybe it was a bad idea,

but that hose water
really did hit the spot.

- The '70s were great if
you had big, beautiful hair.

But what if you had
little or no hair?

Well, there was a fix
that could help you.

Unfortunately, it
really, really hurt.

- [Adam] Jim Morrison has
long flowing locks.

The Beatles are
growing their hair out.

My gosh, there's even a musical
on Broadway called "Hair."

- You did not want to be the
bald guy in a singles bar.

You wanted to have that
full head of rich hair.

So, if God didn't give you that,

you were going to do
whatever you could

to make it look like he did.

- [Adam] There was nothing
subtle about it,

but men felt they needed

to have a thick, luscious
mane of hair on their heads.

The idea of having a hairpiece
is much more widely accepted.

- [Henry] In the '60s and '70s,

men are buying hairpieces
like never before.

And some of the most
famous heads in Hollywood

are crowned in fake hair.

The problem is
toupees at the time

are often unruly and unreliable.

- Any good toupee was
made from real human hair

woven into a flesh-colored mesh,

and it was attached
using a form of cement,

which had its own problems

because the
toupee would get hot.

- It's like you're gluing
this thing to your head,

and if you start to
sweat, maybe it falls off.

- [Hakeem] These things are
super expensive,

and because they're
prone to flying off,

you got to worry about
getting laughed at

after spending a fortune.

- [Negin] There were running
jokes about it

on "The Carol Burnett
Show," on "Match Game."

This became like a big
part of joke culture.

- [Henry] But a breakthrough
from World w*r II

is about to be repurposed
for the human head.

- [Adam] Scientists during
the Second World w*r

realized that plastic
can be extruded

and spun out like a fine thread

that can be woven into a rope

for parachute cables
and parachute scraps.

So now the technology
exists to take plastic

and turn it into
gossamer thin strands.

Strands very much like
the hairs on our head.

- [Martin] Instead of using an
adhesive

to make your toupee
stay on your head,

they would stitch these clumps

of synthetic hair
into your scalp.

- [Hakeem] Synthetic hair
transplants

weren't the very first
type of hair transplant.

Prior to that, there were
natural hair transplants

where they would take hair
from the back of your head

and replant it in the
front of your head.

Incredibly painful process.

So, with the synthetic hair,
you're not moving hair,

you're actually adding
new stuff to the head.

- [Martin] You can style it, you
can put products in it.

You don't have to worry about it

getting blown off in the wind.

You can go swimming
with it on your head.

It looks like the better
solution than the toupee.

- [Henry] By 1979, there
are 30 clinics in America

implanting synthetic hair
into thousands of heads.

But customers are getting a
lot more than a new hairline.

- Stitching bundles of
plastic hair into human heads.

What could go wrong?

- It's essentially like
plugging fishing line

into your head.

- [Martin] The material that
is producing it

contains an ingredient list
that's a little bit alarming.

- [Adam] People are willingly
putting

within a few inches
of their brain

petroleum, limestone,
natural gas, and ammonia.

Why on earth would
you want that showed

into your head in bundles?

- [Hakeem] The body knows
something's not right

and the immune system reacts
to this synthetic hair.

It can result in inflamed
scalps and massive pain.

The body rejects the fibers,

and in some cases, push
them right back out.

- [Negin] In order to stop the
infection from spreading,

some people have to get
part of their scalp removed.

And one patient even finds
a needle in his head.

- [Jason] So, by 1983, 10,000
victims of synthetic hair

implants have been identified.

- [Martin] Because of this, the
FDA bans the synthetic hair

implant as a medical device.

It's the first time

that the FDA ever
banned a medical device.

- Sure hair is important,
but so is keeping your scalp.

- Your bed is
usually a safe space,

one you can always depend on.

But somehow, the
'70s even found a way

to make sleeping a
dance with danger.

- [Natalia] When you look at
the United States

in the 1960s versus the 1950s,

there are some real changes in
pop culture that are obvious.

One place this shows up

is in how people
decorate their homes.

- [Jason] '50s furniture has
structured edges, clean lines.

It's sophisticated,
but very conservative.

- [Negin] So by the '60s,
informality is the thing.

Chairs get replaced by cushions,

and then by the
end of the decade,

everything is replaced
with like a beanbag

that has no structure.

- [Natalia] In around 1967,

a student designer named
Charlie Hall has an idea.

What if he can make something
with even less structure

than a floor cushion?

- [Hakeem] Charlie figures
water would work best

for a big flat surface.

Then it comes to him. How
about a big flat mattress?

- [Jason] It's an 8 by 8 vinyl
mattress and he dubs it

the waterbed.

- Even before this thing goes
to market, it has gone viral.

- Well, one example
is that Hugh Hefner,

who, of course, just
represents the era,

orders a custom waterbed right
away that's green velvet.

- Jefferson Airplane wants one.

I mean, all of the hot
influencers of the time

want this waterbed even
before it hits the market.

- It spreads in California
and the counterculture

just by word of mouth alone,

and that's what really starts
this big national trend.

- So much coming
out of California.

It's like the, it makes
sense when you look at it

that then Silicon Valley also
came out of California, right?

When the waterbed
is your precedent.

- [Hakeem] By 1971, Hall has a
patent and his waterbeds

in department stores
around the country.

- [Negin] There is like a
nationwide craze.

They have really fun
marketing campaign.

They have a poster that says,

"Two things are
better in a waterbed.

One of them is sleep."

- [Henry] America's love
affair with the waterbed

continues well into the '80s.

Eventually, one in every
five beds sold is a waterbed.

- [Natalia] The market is
crowded.

All these sellers are
desperate to stand out.

So they release these
over-the-top ad campaigns

where they're crowing about
their low, low, low prices.

- Come and get your free money
at Country Boy Waterbeds.

- [Henry] At its height,
there are over 1,200 companies

pumping up a $2
billion industry,

but competition drowns the
market with cheap knockoffs.

- [Hakeem] A bed filled with
water

is one place you definitely
don't want to cut corners.

- [Jason] You could puncture it
with a piece of jewelry.

Your dog or cat could
jump on the bed.

And if one of those claws
goes through that thing,

all of a sudden now
you've got a flood.

It's all the dangers of water
delivered in your mattress.

- [Austin] A waterbed weighs
nearly one ton.

That's like having a
small car in your bedroom.

- [Henry] Rumors spread
about heavy waterbeds

crashing through ceilings.

Now, some of that
might be urban legend,

but waterbeds do
hide real dangers.

- [Jason] There is a freak
accident in 1976 in Ventura,

California, where a woman is
sleeping on her waterbed.

So, this rogue wave gets
created inside her waterbed,

which as you can imagine, sort
of pops her out of the bed,

and then the mattress
sort of follows her,

and so, plops right
out on top of her.

- [Natalia] By 1983, damage from
waterbeds become such a problem

that 60% of California
landlords ban them.

- [Henry] And surprisingly,
the biggest risk from waterbeds

has nothing to do with water.

- So, you had to
heat the waterbed

if you didn't want the
bed to be very, very cold.

So, it used a pretty traditional
heating coil of that era.

- Like many heating
devices of this era,

these heaters lack
safety devices

and are prone to causing
electrical fires.

And you'd think that


would douse the danger.

But, because water
conducts electricity,

it can actually make an
electrical fire worse.

- [Negin] So you see these
stories

throughout the
'70s and early '80s

of mattresses
bursting into flames

and then setting the
entire bedroom on fire.

- [Austin] By the late 1980s,
the old heating coils

are replaced with newer,
safer, insulated pads

that automatically shut off

when they hit a
certain temperature.

- [Henry] What ultimately
turns the tide on water beds

isn't fires or crushing
the occasional owner.

It's just a shift in taste.

- Though you can
find waterbeds today,

even though they're safer,

many apartment buildings
don't allow them.

So in essence, the
waterbed party is over.

- As we look back at the '70s,

whether we were drinking
lead from a hose,

running naked from the police,

or wondering, hey, why
did my car just blow up?

The more dangerous it was, the
more fondly we remember it.

And somehow we lived
to tell the tale.

It's what made our
hazardous history

survival of the fittest.