This is going back a lot of years, but I remember working a few
summers in the late '50s and early '60s with Canada's then Department
of Transport which was responsible for communications at Canada's
airports.  Zillions of teletypes.

One day I posed our currently circulating question to one of the
technicians and he pointed to a large box under the workbench and said
"Guess!"  The box was full of rolls of teletype tape and bore the label
of the Stone soda straw company.  Yup, you could wind the tape into a
helix and make a soda straw!

I'm not saying it's the same stuff, but it was close enough to convince
me at the time.

Now we don't even have paper straws.  Sigh!

Jim Heyworth