New York City is in a tizzy, as it's been announced that the U.S. Women's National Team will be honored this Friday with a rare ticker tape parade in the Canyon of Hero(in)es, lower Broadway's stretch that is typically reserved for hometown sports teams.

Not exactly ticker tape, but close

One group of people that are bound to be wondering "What exactly is ticker tape?" are Millennials (except for a handful of hipsters who probably collect, refurbish and curate ticker tape machines as a hobby). First off, let's talk about what ticker tape is not:

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Contrary to popular belief, what you see above isn't what came to be known as ticker tape; those there are strips of paper that came out of the similar teleprinting machines, which used Baudot's Code and other dot-based code systems to send messages over telegraph lines.

In contrast, ticker tape machines—which like teleprinters, were invented in the 1800s—could print actual alphanumeric characters:

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Ticker tape machines were used to send stock prices back and forth across the nation, starting in the 1800s. An operator sat on one end with a special typewriter, and signals representing each typed character zipped along the wires, where the rather beautiful, glass-domed machine on the other end used those signals to turn wheels containing the appropriate character to be stamped. (And actually, "zipped" is a relative term; lag time was reportedly up to 20 minutes.)

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The machines created to print the type made a ticking noise as they operated, which led someone working with them to cleverly name them "tickers." (Hey, these were Wall Street guys, not marketing geniuses.)

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The problem with ticker tape is that it tended to pile up, as you see above. Paper recycling technology in the late 19th Century was virtually nonexistent, and the stuff was too small to wipe your butt with, so it would all just wind up in the trash. Until, that is, the Statue of Liberty dedication was celebrated in New York City, in 1886. That's when the folks working on Wall Street had another brilliant idea: Let's throw all this stuff out the f*cking window! The ticker tape parade was born, a tradition that would persist for decades.

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Sometimes you'll see photos of ticker tape parades featuring long streamers, rather than short torn strips. That's because, unsatisfied with the level of waste produced, some parade watchers threw entire brand-new rolls of ticker tape down onto the street.

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Over the years, the stretch of Lower Broadway near Wall Street became known as the Canyon of Heroes, as veterans, political figures and trophy-bearing local sports teams proceeded along it, being showered with scraps of yesterday's stock figures.

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Amazingly, ticker tape machines held on until the 1960s, until they were eventually replaced with the predecessor to the fax machine. You'll find your local Staples does not stock ticker tape. So when the USWNT is feted on Broadway, they'll be showered not with actual ticker tape, but a much more modern variant: Shredded documents.

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