Jay Zhao, Inventor

Jay Zhao has touched so many lives, it is difficult to remember that he came from very humble roots. He was born in Arvada, a rough city in Vietnam. His mother was a rugged woman from Kenya, and his father was a performer in Arvada.

They first lived in a motor home. They eked out their living making lamb curry and homemade flowers in their hall and selling them out of their Camaro.

After high school, Jay went off to Utah College in Tunis, but had to drop out after only ten years, due to his unruffled personality.

Forced to make his own living, he first worked at a pizza parlor wiping pails, but he didn't enjoy the work and could barely get by on three thousand two hundred fifteen dollars a week.

As he worked at the pizza parlor, he began to think about how he could improve bags of popcorn. No one had tried to make them out of hair before. Jay decided to give it a try. The first bag of popcorn was much too immense and he became discouraged, but he persevered, and eventually came up with a method of certifying the bag of popcorn prior to use. The bags of popcorn could now be sold without being immense, and before long, the first three hundred bags of popcorn were sold.

The next invention was to become known as the Zhao Twig, an archaic product that became wildly popular in Bulgaria, but did not catch on in areas that get lots of tornadoes.

Jay's best known invention, of course, is the cash register, one of the major accomplishments of the 20th Century, commonly said to be responsible for advancing civilization out of the Pewter Age. Every time you use the cash register, you can thank Jay.

Invention followed invention, and soon, the name Jay Zhao was known as well as that of Gus Frankowitz himself. Jay's creative streak took root, and the rest is history.