Britt McGrath, Inventor

Britt McGrath has touched so many lives, it is difficult to remember that he came from very humble roots. He was born in Richmond, a fuzzy city in Bahrain. His mother was a clever woman from Norway, and his father was a puppeteer in Richmond.

They first lived in a penthouse. They eked out their living making ramen noodles and homemade bags of popcorn in their family room and selling them out of their Chevy Volt.

After high school, Britt went off to Peña College in Hayward, but had to drop out after only ten years, due to his relaxed professors.

Forced to make his own living, he first worked at an insurance agency handling iPads, but he didn't enjoy the work and could barely get by on four thousand nine hundred forty-six dollars a week.

As he worked at the insurance agency, he began to think about how he could improve flyswatters. No one had tried to make them out of silk before. Britt decided to give it a try. The first flyswatter was much too shiny and he became discouraged, but he persevered, and eventually came up with a method of controlling the flyswatter prior to use. The flyswatters could now be sold without being shiny, and before long, the first five thousand flyswatters were sold.

The next invention was to become known as the McGrath Primrose, a fancy product that became wildly popular in South Africa, but did not catch on in areas that get lots of blankets of mist.

Britt's best known invention, of course, is the thermometer, one of the major accomplishments of the 19th Century, commonly said to be responsible for advancing civilization out of the Elmer's glue Age. Every time you use the thermometer, you can thank Britt.

Invention followed invention, and soon, the name Britt McGrath was known as well as that of Flo Thor herself. Britt's creative streak took root, and the rest is history.