The Reverend Guppy's Aquarium: From Joseph Frisbie to Roy Jacuzzi, How Everyday Items Were Named for Extraordinary People

by Philip Dodd

What’s in a name? For Philip Dodd, this question led to an international hunt for the best stories of eponymous heroes-- an extraordinarily diverse group of people with just one thing in by chance or deliberately, they have left their names deeply embedded in the language and consciousness of future generations. A few, such as instrument-maker Adolphe Sax, set out to achieve immortality. A handful – Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, for example – positively shunned the prospect. But the majority, like Joseph P. Frisbie or Ernst Gräfenberg (the G in G- spot), simply had no idea that some strange quirk of their lives, work, or personalities would catapult them to fame, or that one day their family name would become a household word. Tracing their varied paths to glory has taken Philip Dodd on a worldwide quest. He has voyaged to the desolate Matagorda peninsula on the Gulf Coast of Texas to find out the truth about the notorious cattle rancher Samuel Maverick. He has

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Reference

272 pages, Hardcover

First published December 27, 2007

Reviews

[Angie Fehl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Essentially, this is a collection of essays on the origin of a number of common household items and terms. I can't say that I found the majority of these stories all THAT interesting, but it had its moments. Some of my favorite bits:

>> the connection between Laszlo Biro (of Biro pen fame) and the Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges

>> the history of Jules Leotard, gymnast / trapeze artist whose name became synonymous with dance wear. In the Leotard section, I also appreciated the "falling with style" Buzz Lightyear reference :-)

>> the Tony award is named after Broadway actress / director / producer Antoinette Perry

>> where the name IKEA comes from: Ingvar Kamprad (founder of the company), Elmtaryd (the name of his family's farm), Agunnaryd (his birthplace)

>> how the female G-spot came to be named after German obstetrician Ernst Grafenberg, a man very modest in nature who likely would have been pretty embarrassed to have his name so famously associated with a woman's trigger spot. He also did some pioneering work with what has come to be known as IUDs, a form of female contraceptive surgically implanted (NOT to be confused with IED, something ENTIRELY different!). There's also an intriguing bio tidbit about how though Grafenberg was a Jew, he avoided the concentration camps with the help of Erich Maria Remarque, author of All Quiet On The Western Front. {Honestly, the whole section on Grafenberg was maybe my favorite portion of the whole book. Just seems like he led a pretty interesting life.}

Dodd does leave his readers with some impressive and inspiring closing thoughts in which he implores everyone to embrace a lifelong curiosity for life and enjoy its weirdness. Live for those truly awe-inspiring moments because the wonder of it all is what makes each day worth trying out ;-)

[Fuzzy Gerdes · Rating 4 out of 5]

I confess I have a weakness for 'factoid' books like >The Reverend Guppy's Aquarium -- a collection of essays about "how everyday items were named for extraordinary people". This one has perhaps a bit more depth than the usual bathroom book -- Philip Dodd gives deft biographical sketches of all of his subjects, beyond the simple circumstances of their language-enhancing exploits, and he also does his research, penetrating past oft-repeated hearsay to find the truth. Reverend Guppy, for example, was not actually a Reverend, but hated tying ties and so affected a collar of his own design that later biographers assumed was a clerical collar.

One nit, picked: Dodd's previous claim to fame was being the "as told to" of the Rolling Stones' autobiography and he name-drops Mick Jagger and Keith Richards at rather odd moments.

But I'll forgive Dodd any self-agrandizement for relating these two maxims from Jules Léotard's (the original "daring youing man on the flying trapeze") Mémoires (published at age 22 -- the quick celebrity autobiography has been around since the mid-nineteenth century, it seems):

Never judge a man by his mustache.

and

Make sure you never catch typhoid fever if you have something else to do.

Words to live by, my friends.

[Spike Gomes · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The Reverend Guppy's Aquarium" is something of an ironic title. It turns out that Guppy was not a Reverend, nor did he have an aquarium. He did however lend his name to the pet fish most of us are acquainted with in our childhood due to an act of scientific mislabeling by an overworked and somewhat tragic curator of a Victorian British scientific institution. This book is a delightful and breezy jaunt through the history of several well known eponymous personages, some well known, and some forgotten to history. While Dodd labels his selection mechanism in the introduction, it seems that the real process involved picking people who were obscure, such as Robert Lechmere Guppy or Antoinette Perry of the Tony Awards, colorful, like Adolphe Sax and Jules Leotard, brilliant like Laszlo Biro, misunderstood by history like Anton Mesmer, or all of the above, like Dr. Ernst Grafenburg. In all, it makes for a nicely colorful and entertaining read, if not particularly revelatory or deep. There's not much to take away from it, even if it is enjoyable. It's what I would consider a pop history book well made for airplane or bus reading. If you're like me and you really like historical trivia and travel writing, it's worth a read. If you're the sort of person who needs to have some sort of didactic purpose to non-fiction reading, then you'll probably be disappointed.

3.5 out of 5 stars.

[Nick Davies · Rating 3 out of 5]

The idea is interesting - the author seeks to flesh out the stories of a number of well-chosen people from whom we get the names of a variety of eponymous objects, from frisbees and saxophones to freesia and the G-spot. The writing style is pleasant enough, and though there are a few too many tangents into the bits and bobs of genealogy (and a hint of the author being a frustrated travel writer?) it was a nice enough read.

I only rate it so averagely because it didn't quite 'hang' together for me - the range of examples chosen made for a very loosely-connected set of mini-biographies which didn't feel as 'right' as a collection of stories about more closely connected people within a narrower field. You could justifiably ask why I bought a book which was about something I'm not hugely interested in (it was very cheap, that's why!) but I was slightly underwhelmed. It was a pleasant light read though, some quirky facts and stuff..

[Beorn · Rating 2 out of 5]

An in depth, informative look at a selection of everyday objects named either after their inventors or some other key figure in their origins.
Rather lets itself down by being overly pompous at times and being far too prone to wistful meanderings & ponderings.

A bit like the book equivalent of a stuffy Radio 4 documentary you might listen to because you're bored in the car but you'll soon get bored and flick to other stations.

[Fishface · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a funny little book about one man's quest to find out where many commonly-recognized objects got their names -- including the guppy, the Frisbee, and quite a few others. It combines the best features of a travel book and a history. I was never clear about whether this guy travelled the world looking just for these answers, or if he just happened to be vacationing in some obscure corner of the world and stumbled across this or that.

[Benjamin Elliott · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought this was a fun concept for a book, and it gave me a chance to learn about some interesting individuals without having to read a full-length biography of each one. My interest in each section was inconsistent, but that is to be expected with such a varied subject range. The author was very British in a way that was hard to connect with on a couple occasions, but the book on a whole was enjoyable.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little dry at times, but interesting none-the-less. I did start skipping around to read in a different order, but ultimately read all but one chapter. Sadly, I don't care about the origin of Biro pens.

[Jennifer Kunz · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great book! Lots of info on the people, and personal story of author's investigating said people was interwoven nicely. For me, an anglophile, I enjoyed all the British terms and spellings - and outlook as well. Recommend!

[Joy]

Well done, interesting writing. Wish I could retain it all...