Artificial grass is more than what you see professional athletes run around on during a football, baseball, or soccer game. While the first practical application was for a school recreation area, the usefulness and ubiquity of synthetic turf have exploded the last 50 years in a manner its creators may never have imagined.
Artificial Turf: A Brief History
A long time ago – okay, the early 1960s – in a galaxy far, far away – not, ours, in a research lab in the United States state of North Carolina, researchers in lab coats and protective goggles got together and wondered how they could make tougher grass. Eventually, they pooled their collective intelligence and decided the solution was not simply greener grass, but a different kind of turf altogether. Tougher, stronger, and maybe even something that was not green. They decided on artificial grass, realizing that a turf made of plastic would be more durable, easier to maintain, and could be put down in areas that real grass would never grow.
By the mid-1960s, their hard work paid off as synthetic turf began popping up on recreation fields across the United States. Indoor and outdoor, not only for professional athletes but children entertaining themselves on school and community playgrounds.
