Duct tape to everyone's rescue

By now everyone has heard of Wasilla, Alaska. Being the home of recent Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin is not it’s only claim to fame though. It is also home of “The Iditarod,” and the “Iron Dog,” which seems to be the race Sarah’s “dude” has won.

But then even more interestingly, a few years back it was named the Duct Tape Capital of the World which is pretty good considering they probably don’t make duct tape within a thousand miles of there. I’m surprised you didn’t know that.

There are a few other cities, mostly in Ohio, where they do make duct tape which also claim the title, but Wasilla earned it by being the city whose Wal-Mart store sold more of it in 2002 than any Wal-Mart in the world. According to the Duct Tape Guys, who are the premier duct tape pros, that was 325 miles of duct tape, or the equivalent of 314 feet of tape per Wasilla resident.

I’m not sure what they do with all of it up there, but I read that Wasilla resident Bill Murphy put some of it to good use when he was jumped by a grizzly bear while hunting for moose (the second main past time, next to duct-tape taping, for Wasillans).

No, he didn’t wrap up the bear and tape it to a tree as Sarah Palin would have done, but he did bind up the severe bite wounds to his shoulder which held him together while he rode his four-wheeler back to his pickup and then drove himself to the hospital. Most any Wasillan could have done that, and they all have the duct tape to do it with.

So is it “duct tape” or “duck” tape? I always thought that people only thought it was “duck tape” because the “t” on duct is essentially silent anyway, and they didn’t associate it with the use for which I assumed it was obviously invented which is to hold furnaces and air conditioners together.

Well, actually duct tape has been around for a long time. Maybe longer than duct work. It was originally developed for the military during World War II as a water resistant sealing tape for ammunition cases. The tape, usually black or gray, was made of a sealant-coated fabric. That fabric was similar to a fabric called duck. So it’s “duck” name may be older than it’s “duct” one. Call it what you want. If you say it fast enough, no one will know the difference anyway.

The point is, though, according to Wikipedia, shortly after it was issued to military personnel, it began to be used to repair equipment such as jeeps, firearms and aircraft. I believe American Airlines uses it to repair airplanes today, and NASA does send it into space with the shuttle. My son, the pilot, once used it to mend a hole in the wing of his fabric-covered supercub which resulted when it collided with a stray goose during a power-line-inspection run.

Duct tape is the best friend of all dads whose little boys think they can fix anything. It is the first thing DIYers think of when they have a problem.

So from it’s beginnings it was used to fix things, especially in an emergency. Since then, it has come a ways to its current stature which is that of cultural icon. Of late, it has become the raw material used for manufacturing almost anything. I have seen purses, belts, wallets, notebook covers, Ipod covers, American flags, shoelaces, flip-flops and designer clothing. If you think you are missing some of the possible uses for duct tape, there are books and websites to fill you in. Some people take this very seriously. Myself, I like the security of having a roll in my car for the traditional reason.

Yet even I, who am usually pop-culturally clueless, have joined in and made magic wallets for my grandkids in their favorite colors. They were the hot item at the next show-and-tell.

I don’t know who to credit with this dead-on assessment of duct tape, but it is good: “Duct tape is like The Force. It has a dark side and a light side and it holds the universe together.”

I’m going to go put some on my fridge right now. Shall I use camo grunge or neon pink?

Speaking of fridge, maybe our friends in Wasilla have discovered some way to tap into The Force and harness its energy for producing heat. Could be another well-kept secret. Or maybe they are just using it to hold their furnaces together.