Short Stuff: Rube Goldberg

In this episode, Josh and Chuck dive into the fascinating life of Rube Goldberg, the cartoonist and engineer who became so famous for drawing absurdly complicated contraptions that his name is now literally an adjective in the dictionary. They explore how this Cal Berkeley-trained engineer ditched a well-paying mining job to pursue cartooning in New York, and how his various creations like "Foolish Questions" and the character Professor Lucifer Gorgonzola Butts became nationwide sensations. You'll learn about his inventive cartoon machines, his political cartooning work that won him a Pulitzer Prize, and the surprising way his name and legacy live on today through games like Mousetrap—though apparently without proper credit or payment from the creators.