Christian Adolf Jurgensen III better known as, Sonny Jurgensen, might have played in an era of football where quarterbacks were extremely reserved, but Jurgensen was willing to take risks through the air while he was on the field. During his tenure in the NFL, a lot of controversy surrounded his style of play for refusing to play ball-controlled conservative football. His unwillingness to conform split the city of Washington DC in half on whether Jurgensen or the team's second option should be the starting quarterback for the Redskins back in the early 1970s. Jurgensen attended Duke University from 1954 to 1956 and had an instant impact on the field as a defensive back. In his initial year with the team, Jurgensen broke a school record, nabbing an interception in four consecutive games. The following year, Sonny took over as starting quarterback and led the Blue Devils to an ACC co-championship. Despite starting out hot, Jurgensen had an abysmal final year at Duke, finishing the season 5-4-1.
Sonny Jurgensen would go on to be drafted 43rd overall in the fourth round of the 1957 NFL Draft by the Philadelphia Eagles where he would play seven seasons out of the eighteen seasons of his total NFL career. Sonny would go on to win an NFL Championship with the Eagles as a backup in 1960 but threw for an NFL record 3,723 yards and an NFL record-tying 32 touchdowns the following year as the team's starting quarterback. At the time, this was unheard of and Jurgensen began to revolutionize the game as a precision passer throughout his entire NFL career. In 1964, 5x Pro Bowler signed a deal with the Washington Redskins where he would play for the next decade before retiring. Throughout Jurgensen's nearly two-decade career, he would lead the league in passing yards five times as well as touchdowns twice.
When we think of inventors, the image that comes to mind is usually that of a frazzled scientist toiling away in a lab, not celebrities pulled from the pages of Us Weekly. However, a number of well-known public figures hold patents for various innovations. Some are related to the work that made them famous, while others are offshoots of hobbies or just a single great idea.
Part of guitar wizard Eddie Van Halen's signature sound was his two-handed tapping technique, but letting all ten fingers fly while simultaneously holding up the guitar's neck could get a bit tricky. Van Halen came up with a novel way to get around this problem, though; he invented a support (top) that could flip out of the back of his axe's body to raise and stabilize the fretboard so he could tap out searing songs like "Eruption." While Van Halen was obviously interested in improving his guitar work, the patent application he filed in 1985 notes that the device would work with any stringed instrument. Want to tap out a scorching mandolin solo? Find someone selling Eddie's device.
It’s probably not surprising that James Cameron—who designed a submersible to take him to the deepest known part of the ocean—will often invent technology to make his films if what he needs doesn’t exist. He holds a number of patents, including US Patent No. 4996938, “apparatus for propelling a user in an underwater environment,” that he and his brother, Michael, created to film The Abyss and patented in 1989. The device is basically an underwater dolly equipped with propellers that makes it easy for a camera operator to maneuver in the water—and allowed Cameron to capture the shots he wanted for the 1989 film, part of which was filmed in an abandoned nuclear reactor.
In 1987 Jamie Lee Curtis designed and patented a disposable diaper that included a waterproof pocket that held baby wipes. She hasn't profited from her idea yet, though, since she refuses to license the patent until diaper companies make biodegradable products.
You know him as a rock legend, but Neil Young also loves trains—so much that he owns a stake in a model train manufacturing company and has an extensive collection. He also holds seven patents related to model trains, including Patent No. US5441223, "Model train controller using electromagnetic field between track and ground."