Heeeere's Johnnnnnny....

Of course, Johnny, like most talk show hosts, had a staff that helped write his monologue. His writers had heard earlier in the day about a Wisconsin congressman named Harold Froehlich. Froelich claimed that the federal government was falling behind in getting bids to supply toilet paper and that "The United States may face a serious shortage of toilet tissue within a few months".

His writers decided to include a joke based on this quote in Carson's monologue. He said "You know what's disappearing from the supermarket shelves? Toilet paper. There's an acute shortage of toilet paper in the United States."

Too bad they couldn't see the consequence of this statement. You may not be aware if you are young, but the early 1970's was a time of shortages - oil in particular. The next morning, many of the 20 million television viewers ran to the supermarket and bought all the toilet paper they could find. By noon, most of the stores were out of stock! Stores tried to ration the stuff, but they couldn't keep up with demand.

Johnny Carson went on the air several nights later and explained that there was no shortage and apologized for scaring the public. Unfortunately, people saw all the empty shelves in the stores, so the stampede continued.

Scott Paper showed video of their plants in full production to the public and asked them to stay calm - there was no shortage. The video was of little help. The panic fed itself and continued.

They finally got the shelves restocked three weeks later and the shortage was over. It is the only time in American history that the consumer actually created a major shortage (I don't think that the "shortage" of Barbie or Power Ranger dolls at Christmas time could be classified as a real shortage!).

And to think that it all started as a joke.

Useless? Useful? I’ll leave that for you to decide.

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The internet is over-rated.