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Harold Nathan Braunhut aka Harold von Braunhut (31 March 1926 - 28 November 2003) was an American mail-order marketer and inventor, most famous as the creator and seller of both the Amazing Sea-Monkeys and the X-Ray Specs. Braunhut used comic book advertisements to sell an assortment of quirky products. Braunhut held 195 patents for various products, many of which became cultural icons. Some of his products included:

• X-Ray Specs - whose advertisements claim that the wearer can see through clothing and flesh. The product has appealed to generations of curious adolescent boys.
• Amazing Sea-Monkeys - which were tiny brine shrimp that came to life when water was added. Sales took an upswing when comic book illustrator Joe Orlando drew comic book ads showing the humanized Sea-Monkeys enjoying life in their underwater fantasy world. Billions of the tiny creatures have been sold over the years and have generated fan websites, a television series, and a video game. Astronaut John Glenn took 400 million “Amazing Sea-Monkeys” into space with him in 1998.
• Crazy Crabs - which were simply hermit crabs
• Amazing Hair-Raising Monsters - a card with a printed monster that would grow “hair” (mineral crystals, actually) when water was added.
• Invisible Goldfish - non-existent fish that were guaranteed to remain permanently invisible.

Despite his Jewish ethnicity, the Washington Post stated in a report that he had a close association with white supremacist groups, including buying firearms for a Ku Klux Klan faction and regularly attending the Aryan Nations annual conference. In a 1988 interview with the Seattle Times he referred to the “inscrutable, slanty Korean eyes” of Korean shop owners and was quoted as saying, “You know what side I’m on. I don’t make any bones about it.”

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