According to the calendar and my optimistic self, as we entered 2023 we slid into the second half of winter. As a young child, the end of winter let me engage in an outdoor event that I still occasionally enjoy. The first warm day, I would find my plastic bottle stash of Mr. Bubble replete with the twist off cap that held a wand. Dipping the wand in the solution, I would race outside and watch as soapy bubbles exited the wand. Those that hung in the air were suitable for popping. 

Years later, I decided to find out what a bubble is made of and how it maintains its integrity. I located and spoke with Dr. Hans Blasenmacher of the Berlin Bubble Institute. After his lengthy and detailed lecture about the physics of bubble making, I was able to put it in terms that many of us can understand.

Essentially bubbles rely on the proper liquid solution and service tension to form their shape. A soap bubble is an ultrathin layer of film that encloses air to form a globule. The thin layer exists because the air pressure on the inside and exterior is equal. Any disturbance on either side of the film causes the bubble to burst. The disturbance could be a collision of the bubble with another object such as the pavement, tree branch or the poking index finger of a giggling 5-year old.

In 1884 it was proven that a simple spherical soap bubble used the least area to enclose a measured volume of air. However, in 2001, scientists found that two bubbles of unequal size, once joined together enclosed a larger volume of air with the least surface area of soapy film. The latter has been named the “double bubble conjecture.” Please note, that theory has nothing to do with the chewing gum of the same name.

I could go on delving into the physics of soap bubbles. But instead, let us explore some of the interesting things people have attempted using soap bubbles to gain recognition by the Guinness Book of World Records. 

A man with an amazing lung capacity, Chang Yu-Te, blew up the internet a few years ago by performing a Guinness worthy record for blowing soap bubbles. Taking a deep breath, he blew a large bubble bigger than his head. Then taking another deep breath he pressed his lips against the bubble’s thin membrane and exhaled creating smaller bubbles that settled on the bottom of the larger bubble. Midway through achieving his record, he took another breath and continued until the larger bubble burst at the 783 mark. The feat was filmed in slow motion enabling the smaller bubbles to be counted.

If you google his name and bubble records, you can see his record-breaking feat and, staying with it, another record he broke. Wearing a latex glove Chang was able to deftly bounce a bubble with his palm 290 times.

“Sam Sam the Bubble Man” holds the record for enclosing the most people in a soap bubble. He convinced 19 people to stay still on a circular wooden platform as he formed a huge bubble around them. Guinness awarded the record after confirming that each person in the bubble was at least 5 feet tall.

Bubble blowing records are not confined to the use of a soapy mixture. As evidenced by the continued surge in sales of bubble gum, chewing and creating pink bubbles also attracts those seeking Guinness record fame. In 2004, Chad Fell from Winston County in Alabama, blew the largest bubblegum bubble without using his hands. It measured in at 20 inches in diameter which is almost twice the size of a basketball. What was not reported was what happened when it popped. It probably took weeks to get the gum out of his beard.

Bubblegum blowing records are not held solely by men. On the television show “Guinness World Records: Primetime,” Joyce Samuels used her nose to create a bubblegum bubble that measured 11 inches in diameter. She pre-chewed the gum for an hour to get the sugar out to make the wad more malleable before inserting it in her nose. That Guinness record required a bit of nasal intelligence.

Hudson Cooper is a resident of Sullivan County, a writer, comedian and actor.