Some of the neatest products are made from the byproducts of other industries. Take petroleum jelly, for example. Its inventor, Robert Chesebrough, a chemist from New York, came upon his idea while visiting the oil fields of Titusville, Pennsylvania in 1859. It took him ten years to perfect his formula, but the product has been a household staple ever since. Chesebrough so believed in Vaseline that he ingested a spoonful of it every day, and attributed his 96-year longevity to doing so.

Well, some byproducts can simply be beautiful, or at least interesting. On that note, welcome to a new series called Boss Byproducts. We recently ran an article about a laser-engraved painting technique that is similar to the production of Fordite. I had never heard of Fordite, but as soon as I found out what it was, I had to have some. So, here we go!

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