How not to get information?
June 15th 2008 08:44
Sometimes the Internet is a little wide of the factual mark. As Sam Seaborn in The West Wing says somewhere in season two: I won’t use those stats unless I have them from three different sources. (My paraphrase.)
I wanted to check who invented the Swiss Army knife.
ChevronCars.com says this:
The Swiss Army knife was invented by Karl Eisner in 1891. Eisner was inspired to create a tool for the Swiss Army that was not manufactured by Germans, so he set out to produce a Swiss knife for the Swiss Army.
This piece of information is copied all over the place, particularly on blogs. Note the spelling of the name.
The English newspaper the Guardian, had this in one of its articles:
Elsener is the great-grandson of Karl Elsener, the man who, in 1884, invented the Swiss army knife. At a time when Switzerland was one of Europe's poorest countries, Elsener wanted to create jobs. He decided to build a knife factory. Soon, he was turning out knives for Switzerland's famously non-combative army.
This seems a long way from the generally-accepted facts.
CorporateDesignFoundation.org fudges:
This ingenious pocketknife was invented in the late 1800s by a Swiss cutler named Karl Elsener. Elsener wanted to stimulate employment in the poverty-stricken district in which he grew up by crafting knives that were then being imported from Germany.
An extensive Wikipedia article pins things down a bit more:
In 1891, Karl Elsener, then owner of a company that made surgical equipment, discovered to his dismay that the pocket knives supplied to the Swiss army were in fact made in Germany. In that age of nationalism, Elsener set out to manufacture the knives in Switzerland itself. Elsener began working on what became the predecessor to the modern Swiss Army knife, called the "Soldier's Knife". The original had a wooden handle, as opposed to the plastic and metal seen today, and featured a cutting blade, a screwdriver, a can opener, and a punch. This knife was sold to the Swiss army, but Elsener was not satisfied with its first incarnation. In 1896, after five years of hard work, Elsener managed to put the blades on both sides of the handle using a special spring mechanism, allowing him to use the same spring to hold them in place, an innovation at the time. This allowed Elsener to put twice as many features on the knife; he added a second cutting blade and a corkscrew.
So the idea came about in 1891, but the ‘incarnation’ didn’t arrive until five years later, a point no one else seems to make.
And for those who enjoy foreign English, here’s a Spanish version of the story:
The history of Victorinox knife began in 1891. The cutler Karl Elsener founded the Swiss Association of cutlers with the purpose of creating jobs and to make the knife for soldiers destined the Swiss Army, after he himself, introduced new foods tinned for cases of emergency and adopted rifle that required a screwdriver to mount and to dismount, a basic task that they have to do all soldiers.
Starts out well, finishes a little poorly…
I wanted to check who invented the Swiss Army knife.
ChevronCars.com says this:
The Swiss Army knife was invented by Karl Eisner in 1891. Eisner was inspired to create a tool for the Swiss Army that was not manufactured by Germans, so he set out to produce a Swiss knife for the Swiss Army.
This piece of information is copied all over the place, particularly on blogs. Note the spelling of the name.
The English newspaper the Guardian, had this in one of its articles:
Elsener is the great-grandson of Karl Elsener, the man who, in 1884, invented the Swiss army knife. At a time when Switzerland was one of Europe's poorest countries, Elsener wanted to create jobs. He decided to build a knife factory. Soon, he was turning out knives for Switzerland's famously non-combative army.
This seems a long way from the generally-accepted facts.
CorporateDesignFoundation.org fudges:
This ingenious pocketknife was invented in the late 1800s by a Swiss cutler named Karl Elsener. Elsener wanted to stimulate employment in the poverty-stricken district in which he grew up by crafting knives that were then being imported from Germany.
An extensive Wikipedia article pins things down a bit more:
In 1891, Karl Elsener, then owner of a company that made surgical equipment, discovered to his dismay that the pocket knives supplied to the Swiss army were in fact made in Germany. In that age of nationalism, Elsener set out to manufacture the knives in Switzerland itself. Elsener began working on what became the predecessor to the modern Swiss Army knife, called the "Soldier's Knife". The original had a wooden handle, as opposed to the plastic and metal seen today, and featured a cutting blade, a screwdriver, a can opener, and a punch. This knife was sold to the Swiss army, but Elsener was not satisfied with its first incarnation. In 1896, after five years of hard work, Elsener managed to put the blades on both sides of the handle using a special spring mechanism, allowing him to use the same spring to hold them in place, an innovation at the time. This allowed Elsener to put twice as many features on the knife; he added a second cutting blade and a corkscrew.
So the idea came about in 1891, but the ‘incarnation’ didn’t arrive until five years later, a point no one else seems to make.
And for those who enjoy foreign English, here’s a Spanish version of the story:
The history of Victorinox knife began in 1891. The cutler Karl Elsener founded the Swiss Association of cutlers with the purpose of creating jobs and to make the knife for soldiers destined the Swiss Army, after he himself, introduced new foods tinned for cases of emergency and adopted rifle that required a screwdriver to mount and to dismount, a basic task that they have to do all soldiers.
Starts out well, finishes a little poorly…
One of the simpler versions of the Knife
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