Every engineer knows that behind every successful system lies a series of smart design choices, and Thanksgiving dinner is no exception. The tradition of a golden, roasted turkey at the center of the holiday table didn’t happen by accident; it evolved through history, practicality, and a bit of optimization.

In The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, he lists thirteen virtues “all that at that time occurr’d to me as necessary or desirable.”

The evolution of pulleys is fascinating. These mechanisms we take for granted in everyday life actually have their roots in civilizations dating back 5500 years. Since then, the number of improvements and uses have increased to a staggering level, forever revolutionizing societies across the globe.

A natural refinement to the invention of the wheel, gears were thought to have been invented by the Greeks. Philosopher and scientist, Aristotle, wrote about a rotating wheel that turned another wheel in the opposite direction in the fourth century B.C.E. By the third century B.C.E., water wheels and clocks were common on the Greek peninsula. Yet, the first specific mention of gears in Greek writings occurred around 50 C.E. by Heron of Alexandria, a mathematician and inventor. Heron is most renowned for Metrica, a three-volume compendium of observations of the mathematics and engineering of Babylonia, ancient Egypt, and the Greco-Roman world.