What You Need
- Two strips of stiff 1-by-3-inch cardboard
- Pencil
- Scissors
- Glass chimney from a hurricane lamp
- Scotch Tape
- Strip of 4-by-11-inch poster board
- 1/2 cup Rice Krispies cereal
- Blow dryer
What to Do
Holding the 1-by-3-inch cardboard strips horizontally, draw a line through the center of each strip, perpendicular to its length. Cut 1/2-inch into each line. Fit the two cardboard strips together at the cuts to form a sturdy, cross-shaped support for the glass chimney.
Set the glass chimney on top of the cardboard support. Tape the ends of the 4-by-11-inch strip of poster board together to form a loop. Place the loop around the glass chimney's cardboard support to create a fence.
Pour the Rice Krispies into the opening at the top of the chimney.
Use the blow dryer to blow a stream of air across the top of the glass chimney.
What Happens
The Rice Krispies rise and float through the glass chimney.
Why It Works
The air blowing rapidly across the top of the glass chimney creates increased air pressure at the bottom of the glass chimney, causing the Rice Krispies to rise. Bernoulli's principle (named for Swiss mathematician Daniel Bernoulli) puts it this way: As the velocity of a gas or liquid increases, the pressure perpendicular to its direction of flow decreases.
Bizarre Facts
- In the 1890s, the health-conscious Dr. John Harvey Kellogg and his brother, W. K. Kellogg, invented Corn Flakes while working at the Battle Creek Sanitarium, and had a spiteful relationship for the rest of their lives.
- The Kellogg brothers invented peanut butter, but failed to patent it.
- C. W. Post, a former patient of the Kellogg brothers at the Battle Creek Sanitarium, launched Grape Nuts, a cereal similar to Granola, a cereal invented by the Kelloggs and served at the sanitarium.
- Although he invented Granola and Corn Flakes, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg breakfasted daily on seven graham crackers.
- The average American cupboard contains four different brands of cereal.
- In 1959, with only one hundred dollars, Leandro P. Rizzuto and his parents, Julian and Josephine, started Continental Hair Products in New York City to market hair rollers for beauty salons. In 1968, the company developed the hot comb, and in 1971 introduced the first hand-held pistol-grip blow dryer.
- Bernoulli's principle makes it is possible to sail a boat forward against the wind.
Snap! Crackle! Pop!
In 1928, the Kellogg Company introduced Kellogg's Rice Krispies as "the Talking Cereal." In 1933, a year after the phrase "Snap! Crackle! Pop!" was printed on the box, a tiny, nameless gnome wearing a baker's hat appeared on the side of the box. He eventually became known as Snap, and in the mid-1930s he was joined by Crackle (wearing a red striped stocking cap) and Pop (in a military hat). Snap, Crackle, and Pop are the Kellogg Company's oldest cartoon characters.
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