8 Things you didn't know were invented by Australians

Australia has a long and distinguished history of invention and innovation. At least that's what Wikipedia tells me. Here are a few examples:

1) The Box Kite - Invented by Aviation Pioneer Lawrence Hargrave in the early 1890s after noticing that his empty twelve pack seemed to catch the wind better than his previously attempted flying invention the Stubby-Glider.


2) The Sarich Engine - An orbital combustion engine invented by Perth engineer Ralph Sarich in 1972 used to make 2-stroke engines cleaner and more powerful. Not to be confused with the "Search Engine" which was invented by George Randolph Google in 1995 and is used to find hilarious videos of cats doing uncharacteristic things like playing a piano or eating a plate of spaghetti.

3) Black Box Flight Recorder - This famous device was invented in 1958 by Dr David Warren at the Aeronautical Research Laboratories in Melbourne. Despite the name, modern versions come in a range of designer colours such as "Bottom-of-the-Sea Blue" and "Mid-Air Collision Orange"

4) Hills Hoist - The rotary washing line with hoist quickly became a fixture in Australian back yards. The original design was by Gilbert Toyne in Geelong in 1912, but Lance Hill of Adelaide further developed the design from 1945 onwards and marketed it under the name of the Hills Hoist. "I want a painfully slow way for my clothes to be slightly damp, covered in possum feces and possibly floating in my neighbor's pool." I imagine he said at some point.

5) Wine Cask - The flexible bag inside a box was first developed by Thomas Angove of South Australia in 1965 and later given the now familiar tap by Penfolds Wines and brought to market by Sam Wynn of Wynnvale Wines. This design has now become almost universal for grade z wine on the bottom shelf in the back of the liquor store. 

6) Internet WiFi - Developed by an Australian team at the CSIRO headed by Dr John O'Sullivan who was some kind of pervert dissatisfied with slow loading pornography probably.

7) Feature Length Film - The Story of the Kelly Gang, made in 1906 is regarded as the first feature length film ever made. It ran for more than an hour and featured Mick Jagger at the height of his career.

8) Spray-on-skin - A treatment for burn victims developed by Dr Fiona Wood which was used to great effect after the 2002 Bali terrorist bombings and is also what keeps Nicole Kidman's face from falling off and sliding into the ocean.