Wayback machine
Encyclopedia
The WABAC Machine refers to a fictional machine from the cartoon segment Peabody's Improbable History, an ongoing feature of the 1960's cartoon
series The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show
. The WABAC Machine is a plot device
used to transport the characters Mr. Peabody
and Sherman back in time
. The meaning of the acronym is unknown, but mid-century, big-science project names, such as ENIAC
and JOHNNIAC
, often ended in "AC".
, a professorial, bow tie-wearing dog, as a birthday gift for Sherman, Mr. Peabody's pet boy, to be able to visit famous historical events. At the request of Mr. Peabody ("Sherman, set the WABAC machine to ..."), Sherman
would set the WABAC machine to a time and place of historical importance, and the two would be instantly transported there. The machine apparently later returned Mr. Peabody and Sherman to the present, although the return trip was never shown.
According to Gerard Baldwin, one of the show's directors, the name "WABAC" is a reference to the UNIVAC I
.
, for example. As in the original cartoon, the Wayback Machine is often invoked to suggest the audience follow the narrator back to the past. Frequently such visits to the past are trips of nostalgia, remembering times, places, or things of the not-so-distant past.
One example of popular usage occurred in "Goofy Ball", a 1995 episode of the TV show NewsRadio
, when station owner Jimmy James (Stephen Root
) says: "Dave, don't mess with a man with a Wayback Machine. I can make it so you were never born
."
The Wayback Machine
of the Internet Archive
was named after the WABAC.
Cartoon
A cartoon is a form of two-dimensional illustrated visual art. While the specific definition has changed over time, modern usage refers to a typically non-realistic or semi-realistic drawing or painting intended for satire, caricature, or humor, or to the artistic style of such works...
series The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show
The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show
The Rocky & Bullwinkle Show is an American animated television series that originally aired from November 19, 1959 to June 28, 1964 on the ABC and NBC television networks...
. The WABAC Machine is a plot device
Plot device
A plot device is an object or character in a story whose sole purpose is to advance the plot of the story, or alternatively to overcome some difficulty in the plot....
used to transport the characters Mr. Peabody
Mister Peabody
Mr. Peabody is a fictional dog who appeared in the late 1950s and early 1960s television animated series Rocky and His Friends and The Bullwinkle Show produced by Jay Ward, collectively referred to as Rocky and Bullwinkle...
and Sherman back in time
Time travel in fiction
Time travel is a common theme in science fiction and is depicted in a variety of media. It simply means either going forward in time or backward, to experience the future, or the past.-Literature:...
. The meaning of the acronym is unknown, but mid-century, big-science project names, such as ENIAC
ENIAC
ENIAC was the first general-purpose electronic computer. It was a Turing-complete digital computer capable of being reprogrammed to solve a full range of computing problems....
and JOHNNIAC
JOHNNIAC
The JOHNNIAC was an early computer built by RAND that was based on the von Neumann architecture that had been pioneered on the IAS machine. It was named in honor of von Neumann, short for John v. Neumann Numerical Integrator and Automatic Computer...
, often ended in "AC".
The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show
Within the Peabody's Improbable History cartoon segment, the machine was constructed by Mr. PeabodyMister Peabody
Mr. Peabody is a fictional dog who appeared in the late 1950s and early 1960s television animated series Rocky and His Friends and The Bullwinkle Show produced by Jay Ward, collectively referred to as Rocky and Bullwinkle...
, a professorial, bow tie-wearing dog, as a birthday gift for Sherman, Mr. Peabody's pet boy, to be able to visit famous historical events. At the request of Mr. Peabody ("Sherman, set the WABAC machine to ..."), Sherman
would set the WABAC machine to a time and place of historical importance, and the two would be instantly transported there. The machine apparently later returned Mr. Peabody and Sherman to the present, although the return trip was never shown.
According to Gerard Baldwin, one of the show's directors, the name "WABAC" is a reference to the UNIVAC I
UNIVAC I
The UNIVAC I was the first commercial computer produced in the United States. It was designed principally by J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, the inventors of the ENIAC...
.
Popular culture
The concept or term "WABAC Machine," more often employed as "Wayback Machine," has been extensively adopted in popular culture as a convenient way to introduce issues or events of the past, often employing the original line "Sherman, set the WABAC machine to ...". This introduction was used by the character Kevin Flynn in the film TronTron
-Film:*Tron , a franchise that began in 1982 with the Walt Disney Pictures film Tron** Tron , a 1982 science fiction film by Disney, starring Jeff Bridges, Bruce Boxleitner, Cindy Morgan, Dan Shor and David Warner...
, for example. As in the original cartoon, the Wayback Machine is often invoked to suggest the audience follow the narrator back to the past. Frequently such visits to the past are trips of nostalgia, remembering times, places, or things of the not-so-distant past.
One example of popular usage occurred in "Goofy Ball", a 1995 episode of the TV show NewsRadio
NewsRadio
NewsRadio is an American television situation comedy that aired on NBC from 1995 to 1999. The series was created by executive producer Paul Simms, and was filmed in front of a studio audience at CBS Studio Center and Sunset Gower Studios...
, when station owner Jimmy James (Stephen Root
Stephen Root
Stephen Root is an American actor. He is best known for his comedic work on the TV sitcom NewsRadio, in the film Office Space and as the voice of Bill Dauterive and Buck Strickland in the animated series King of the Hill...
) says: "Dave, don't mess with a man with a Wayback Machine. I can make it so you were never born
Grandfather paradox
The grandfather paradox is a proposed paradox of time travel first described by the science fiction writer René Barjavel in his 1943 book Le Voyageur Imprudent . The paradox is this: suppose a man traveled back in time and killed his biological grandfather before the latter met the traveler's...
."
The Wayback Machine
Wayback Machine
The Wayback Machine is a digital time capsule created by the Internet Archive non-profit organization, based in San Francisco, California. It is maintained with content from Alexa Internet. The service enables users to see archived versions of web pages across time, which the Archive calls a "three...
of the Internet Archive
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It offers permanent storage and access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, music, moving images, and nearly 3 million public domain books. The Internet Archive...
was named after the WABAC.
See also
- Memory holeMemory holeA memory hole is any mechanism for the alteration or disappearance of inconvenient or embarrassing documents, photographs, transcripts, or other records, such as from a web site or other archive, particularly as part of an attempt to give the impression that something never happened...
- Time travelTime travelTime travel is the concept of moving between different points in time in a manner analogous to moving between different points in space. Time travel could hypothetically involve moving backward in time to a moment earlier than the starting point, or forward to the future of that point without the...
- List of television series that include time travel
- TARDISTARDISThe TARDISGenerally, TARDIS is written in all upper case letters—this convention was popularised by the Target novelisations of the 1970s...
- Back to the FutureBack to the FutureBack to the Future is a 1985 American science-fiction adventure film. It was directed by Robert Zemeckis, written by Zemeckis and Bob Gale, produced by Steven Spielberg, and starred Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover and Thomas F. Wilson. The film tells the story of...
(film)