a fable for any age

PROFESSOR KNOWITALL'S MAGNIFICIENT? INVENTION
By Jim Kittelberger


Professor Knowitall was working very hard in his laboratory.
He had been very impressed by a speech he had heard recently.
The speech was about shortages all over the world and what we could do about it. Well, since Professor Knowitall was an expert in rubber plants, he could make sure that all the children in the world would have a ball to play with.


He had all his test tubes filled with different colored fluids. He had a small flame under each one and they were boiling and sputtering and red and green and blue and yellow and pink and a beautiful shade of aquamarine fluid were jumping out of the tubes.


The professor was busy at his desk figuring and re-figuring all his formulas. This would be experiment number eight hundred and fifty two. So far all the experiments had not worked. One of the experiments was pretty close though. It turned the rubber into cement. But cement balls do not bounce very well and were a little heavy to throw back and forth.


Well the moment was at hand; experiment number eight hundred and fifty two was ready to try. The liquid cooled and he shaped it into a ball. It was a beautiful ball, with red, green, blue, yellow, pink and a beautiful shade of aquamarine stripes running all around the ball. Well he was ready to try. He held his breath and gave the ball a hard bounce. Hurrah, Hurrah, it worked. Professor Knowitall had perfected his newest invention, rubber that would divide itself into a perfect copy of the original. After he bounced the ball, he now had two balls exactly the same.


The professor quickly went to work making different kinds of balls for the entire world to see his great discovery. He quickly made some basketballs and took them to the school gym and explained to the coaches how they could save lots of money by buying just one of his balls. They said they would try it. So that night they used one of the professors' new balls. The referee gave the ball to the player and said he didn't see anything different about the ball, and it felt the same.


The game started and the first boy to get the ball started bouncing the ball and it did just like it was supposed to do. It divided into another exact copy of the original ball. Now Professor Knowitall was a great inventor, but he had just one problem with his inventions. He was not very good at looking into the future; he just knew it did what he wanted. It made another exact copy, but he didn't think any further. It not only made one copy; it kept making copies after each bounce. The player bounced the ball and it made another and another player thought that was the game ball and he grabbed it and starting bouncing and that ball started making copies. Well you can see what happened. Soon the whole gym was loaded with basketballs. They covered the floor and soon they were starting to find their way out of the gym into the halls of the school. The kids in the halls picked up a ball and started bouncing it and more balls were made. The school quickly became filled with basketballs and someone opened an outside door and the balls started rolling down the sidewalks. The kids outside picked up a ball and started bouncing it and more balls were created.


Finally the police were called to help stop the balls from taking over the city. They came with all the sirens and flashing lights on, but as soon as they got close the police cars were covered over by the basketballs.


The police were overwhelmed, so they called the Army, and they came with all their tanks, and trucks, and jeeps, and bazookas, and cannons, and hand grenades, and flame throwers. One of the soldiers panicked and threw a hand grenade into the growing mass of balls, but that created more balls. The army finally hid behind trees and buildings and didn't know what to do. They said, "Let the Air Force do it."


The Air Force had the same problem. The more they bombed and strafed the more balls were created. They said, "Let Clint Eastwood do it." Clint looked at the balls with a sneer and yelled at the top of his voice so all could hear. "Balls, you will stop and go away or you will make my day." They didn't, so he took out his 357 magnum and shot the balls. Well you know what happened. Clint turned and ran back to Hollywood. As he was running away, he looked back over his shoulder and said, "The only one who can help you now is Superman."


Superman came and studied and studied the problem. Finally he came up with an answer. He gathered together a huge amount of string and leaped into the sky and flew around and around the balls at super sonic speed, building a net that would hold all the balls. When he was finished, using all his super strength, he leaped once again into the air dragging the mammoth size net with all the balls behind him. He flew into outer space until he was beyond the pull of gravity. There he released all the balls.


Now everyday in Professor Knowitalls city, at 1:58 p.m. all the residents smile when they look up at the red, green, blue, yellow, pink and a beautiful shade of aquamarine stripes planet as it bounces back and forth in the sky, knowing they are once again safe.


But, in a dark corner of the gym sits a little red, green, blue, yellow, pink and a beautiful shade of aquamarine stripped ball that had been overlooked, just waiting for a little boy or girl to pick it up and start bouncing it. Didn’t you just know that would happen?



Jim Kittelberger 2001. All rights reserved.