In the opening of the 1967 film classic, “The Graduate,” the young Benjamin Braddock has just returned to his parents’ home after graduating from college, and now faces the choice of what to do with the rest of his life. At his graduation party, Braddock was accosted by one of the guests offering career advice in one word: “Plastics.”
Only one word in the movie and little to do with the plot, but I’ve always found it intriguing. It turns out that if you chose plastics as a career path in 1967, you may have done very well. Since its invention in 1907, products of virtually every description are made completely or partially from materials that derive from plastics.