Herder & Sohn in Solingen was a knife manufacturer that switched from war production between 1933 and 1945 to focus on plastic kitchen utensils, such as this multifunctional cutting knife. It could peel, slice, cut, chop and grate.
The knife was demonstrated in many shops both before Christmas in 1957 and before Mother's Day in 1958, including by "the quick-witted Swede Krohné" at Bergans & Søn in Tønsberg. According to the manufacturer, it had caused great excitement at international fairs, and was marketed as the ideal Christmas present - at only NOK 16!
The 1950s was marked by great technological optimism, and robots were among the technologies that both raised expectations and created fear. The buzzword "robot" appeared frequently in the media, and was also used extensively in marketing campaigns. In the excitement over its new multifunctional tool, and combined with a desire to get it out to the masses, the German manufacturer might have stretched the truth a bit when they called this a robot. A combined grater and paring knife was perhaps not the technological breakthrough the world was waiting for.
What characterizes a robot, you think?
