Set it…and forget it! But wait…there’s more! Operators are standing by! If you’ve ever watched TV for more than about two seconds, you’re probably familiar with the phenomenon that is the American infomercial—a spate of hours-long TV shows laden with special offers, incredible demonstrations and two-for-one deals on seemingly useless items that can be really hard to turn off.

Little wonder, then, that infomercials are actually as old as television itself. When TVs were introduced commercially in the United States in the 1940s, people didn’t really know what to make of them. They were expensive, only a few channels existed and the picture wasn’t very good. Hollywood didn’t really understand how to deal, either: studios tended to write it off as a fad or mount unnatural, almost unwatchable productions.

Not so advertisers: a few savvy souls realized early on that TV was a fast track to surefire money. One of them was a man named Bill Barnard. Together with his father, W.G. “Papa” Barnard, he had founded a company specializing in blenders, which they sold together at world’s fairs and even boardwalks. Bill saw the potential of television, and in 1949 he convinced Papa to take his sales pitch to the very small screen.

What resulted was somewhat bizarre. In what was likely the first infomercial ever, Papa Barnard peddled Vita-Mix blenders with promises of lifelong health and threats like “you must change the diet of your family, or America is going blind.”

Barnard’s pitch might seem a bit idiosyncratic…after all, it’s predicated on a drink made of what many would consider to be primarily kitchen scraps. But while it’s not certain how well his hawking of juices he promised were perfect for school, factory and everywhere else did at first, one thing is clear: Barnard invented the infomercial. In the 1980s, FCC rules loosened and the golden age of the infomercial began—but the Sham Wows of the world owe it all to one juice-obsessed grandpa with a rickety-looking blender, some kitchen scraps and a dream.