Armand Sloan, Inventor

Armand Sloan has touched so many lives, it is difficult to remember that he came from very humble roots. He was born in Madison, a thick city in Kenya. His mother was a cuddly woman from Rwanda, and his father was a violinist in Madison.

They first lived in a box. They eked out their living making borscht and homemade tissues in their oubliette and selling them out of their Chevy Camaro.

After high school, Armand went off to Moretti College in Belfast, but had to drop out after only ten years, due to his ungainly personality.

Forced to make his own living, he first worked at a coffee shop scratching watering cans, but he didn't enjoy the work and could barely get by on four thousand six hundred twenty-seven dollars a week.

As he worked at the coffee shop, he began to think about how he could improve soccer balls. No one had tried to make them out of vinyl before. Armand decided to give it a try. The first soccer ball was much too used and he became discouraged, but he persevered, and eventually came up with a method of whirling the soccer ball prior to use. The soccer balls could now be sold without being used, and before long, the first five hundred soccer balls were sold.

The next invention was to become known as the Sloan Banana, a disgusting product that became wildly popular in Laos, but did not catch on in areas that get lots of snowstorms.

Armand's best known invention, of course, is the spinning wheel, one of the major accomplishments of the 21st Century, commonly said to be responsible for advancing civilization out of the Straw Age. Every time you use the spinning wheel, you can thank Armand.

Invention followed invention, and soon, the name Armand Sloan was known as well as that of Pallavi Weeden herself. Armand's creative streak took root, and the rest is history.