Loose Lips Sink Ships, or Something Like That

It was 219 years ago Friday that the first lifeboat was tested at sea. The original lifeboat tests on land had been such a great success, folks figured, let's live a little (hence lifeboat). For hundreds of years prior the vessels were called deathboats, and oddly enough, were rarely called into service. I promise I'm not making this next bit up--the official inventor of the lifeboat is Henry Greathead, who you think would be too occupied to create things. But that's not how things went down. Although he almost blew it, his design finally licked his competitor's, but it's a shame they both couldn't have come together as that could have been called the Wouldhave-Greathead boat. No doubt that would have inspired a cheesy 1970s TV show featuring Gavin MacLeod as Captain Schtupping. OK, that last joke was hard to swallow.