We lost a quiet hero recently. Dwayne Roberts, the man who created the frozen burrito back in 1956, passed away at 88. A visionary entrepreneur. A guy who somehow looked at a regular burrito and thought, “Freeze it. The people will love this.” And he was right. That moment inspired a challenge on The Bobby Bones Show, bring in something everyday we use or eat all the time, but whose inventor or origin story most people have never heard.
What followed was equal parts mind-blowing, hilarious, and borderline unbelievable. Turns out the stuff in your kitchen and your fast-food bag has some cinematic backstories.
The Doctor Nobody Believed, Until He Was Gone
Before inventors were changing America with frozen food and fizzy drinks, there was Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis in the 1840s. He dared to suggest a radical, disrespectful, offensive idea: maybe doctors should wash their hands before delivering babies. His colleagues were so insulted by the notion their hands might carry invisible germs, they rejected him. Babies kept dying. Semmelweis lost his job. He ended up in an asylum, where he died years before the world accepted he was right. Today, handwashing is non-negotiable. Back then, it was considered an insult. A tragic reminder that sometimes the future arrives slower than it should.
The Accidental Birth of the Slushy
Fast-forward to Kansas, mid-20th century. A Dairy Queen owner, Omar Knedlik, had a Coke machine that broke. Instead of panicking, he tossed the soda syrup in the freezer to keep it cold. It slushed. Customers loved it. Next thing he knew, he was inventing a machine to make that icy magic consistently. The result? The ICEE. Seven-Eleven liked it so much they licensed it and re-branded theirs the “Slurpee.” Same delicious frozen treat, different name. Sometimes innovation isn’t a lightning bolt. Sometimes it’s a broken soda machine and a guy who hates warm Coke.
Margaritas, But Make Them Frozen
Ready for the ultimate plot twist? The frozen margarita machine was inspired, by the Slurpee machine. In 1971, Mariano Martinez, a restaurant owner in Dallas, noticed his bartenders quitting because they couldn’t keep up with margarita orders. He saw a Slurpee machine at 7-Eleven and thought: “What if we poured tequila in there?” Boom. Frozen margarita. America said, “Yes. And thank you.” His original machine sits in the Smithsonian. As it should.
The Microwave That Started With a Melted Candy Bar
Percy Spencer wasn’t trying to revolutionize kitchens. He was trying to detect enemy planes during WWII. Working with radar tech one day, he noticed a candy bar in his pocket had melted. Curious, he tried popcorn kernels next. They exploded. Then he tried an egg. It blew up in a coworker’s face. He realized the microwaves could be harnessed for cooking, built a metal box to contain them, and gave the world the microwave oven. The first ones were six feet tall, cost the equivalent of $60,000 today, and weighed more than a grizzly bear. Now 90% of homes have one. Percy got a two-dollar bonus from his company.
America’s Most Iconic Taco... Wasn’t Mexican
Prepare your brain: crunchy tacos weren’t really a thing in Mexico. Glen Bell, founder of Taco Bell, popularized the hard-shell taco in the 1960s after experimenting at his burger stand in California. People fell in love, franchises spread, and today Taco Bell has more than 8,500 locations. Mexico gifted the world tacos. America said, “Cool. Let’s fry the shell and sell it in a drive-through.” And honestly? Bless both cultures. Crunchy tacos forever.
Scotch Tape, Courtesy of Sandpaper Problems
In 1928, Richard Drew worked at 3M (then mostly a sandpaper company) and heard auto shop workers complain about paint lines. So he started tinkering with sticky adhesives. His first attempts weren’t sticky enough, but he kept experimenting when he then worked in a cellophane facility and eventually created Scotch Tape.
From baby-saving hygiene to accident-born snacks, a lot of the world’s conveniences boil down to stubbornness, curiosity, and a dash of chaos. A candy bar melts, a Coke machine breaks, a bartender quits, a lab guy messes with cellophane, and suddenly we have microwaves, Slurpees, margaritas, and tape. So here’s to the inventors we never learn about in school. The geniuses. The tinkerers. The frustrated people who just wanted their drink cold or their paint lines straight.