Bill Nye (b. 1955) grew up in Washington D.C. and studied mechanical engineering at Cornell University. He moved to Seattle to work for Boeing and later Sundstrand Data Control. While working as an engineer, he also became interested in standup and the local comedy scene. In 1986 he left his full-time engineering job and soon became a writer and performer on the Seattle comedy show Almost Live! He started doing comedic science demonstrations which were a big hit with the Almost Live! audience. He commissioned this device from Seattle Plastics to demonstrate atmospheric pressure. It hung from the studio ceiling, attached to a vacuum pump so that the two parts adhered together strongly enough for show host John Keister to dangle from it—and then dramatically fall when the pump was reversed. Many of the demonstration props Nye created for Almost Live! were then re-used on his own TV show. This one can be seen in the Bill Nye the Science Guy episode “Pressure.”