Disappearing Spoon, Chapters 13-14

Chapter 13:

Metals that we might find petty today were very valuable in the past. Two such metals are aluminum and bronze. Bronze stole a bit more of the spotlight when Prince Midas of Turkey discovered the secret to forging it from tin and copper. (Tin? Sounds weak, doesn't it? Maybe that's why bronze metals are the most unappreciated ones.) Perhaps because bronze was so closely associated with Midas, many considered it to be the most valuable and sought-after metal in the world. They were rather excited, as well, when the prince discovered to different colors of lead--ooh~~~~! After the fall of bronze, aluminum rose up and made people's eyes sparkle. Chapter 13 talked about gold a lot, even though it's been mentioned throughout the book several times already. Anyone who's paid a lick of attention in history already knows that gold was made famous partially because of gold rushes worldwide. A lot of people seem to think that gold is one of those motherloads, like oil, that hides in the crevices of hard rocks. Gold ore? Well, actually, since gold doesn't bond with any element other than tellurium, it's typically found solidly by itself. That's why people panned for it. When it does bond with tellurium, metals with strange names result.

Chapter 14:

A man named Johann Wolfgang von Goethe might make you think of a composer. But he was a writer, and like anyone who can put thoughts on paper, some of his inner workings were quirky. He proposed a lot of statements about colors. He claimed that color group AB, when added to group CD, would create the reaction AB + CD --> AD + BC. Look familiar? Not sure if it exactly ties into what we're learning in chem. right now, but that smells like a double exchange reaction to me! Maybe Goethe's mind was just very colorful, or maybe he just wasn't looking into anything that anyone cares about. I say this because Sam Kean doesn't seem very, well, keen on Goethe's story. He doesn't consider him legitimate. Chapter 14 also talked about pens, which at one time were extremely valuable. Like the apple products of today, and how there always seems to be a new one, many pens came out in a consecutive row and people felt compelled to buy them.

...The day I see a pen with a touch screen, I will be astonished.