Kevin has a different last name, so it’s kind of doubtful it was his. Still doesn’t hurt to ask - maybe it’s some secret coroner code thing.
Given that this was a tchotchke meant to be given away to potential voters, it’s got to be something that people would want and use (so they’d remember the name of the person running for office). So a lemon zester seems unlikely to me.
If you’d try it on a lemon, we might know if we were on the right track!
Just sayin’ !
Try it! Try it! Try it!
Is it just me or is it strange that “coroner” is an elected position in some places, apparently? Why?! Is there some sort of political interest in the coroner’s office I’m not aware of?
Obviously it’s some promotional item for someone running for office, so it’s cheap. If it’s the Palmyra Schwartz, Palmyra, MO was a small town (it still is) outside of Hannibal located on a railroad line. If it was 1928, then it’s during the heart of Prohibition in a Missouri small town near where Mark Twain grew up. You can forget about lemon zester, or anything else to do with cocktails.
It doesn’t look like a block ice chipper to me. The ones I’ve seen from that era are either shaped like a chisel or have some sort of teeth like a hand rake. It could be an ice shaver, but I’ve never seen on that looked quite like that.
Of all the guesses I’ve seen here, I’d go with some sort of vintage handheld boot scraper a lady or gentlemen could carry with them.
That was my thought as well. The time period would have been too close to prohibition to make any alcohol related items very unlikely for a giveaway.
It could be for fixing screens. The only modern ones I can find have wheels on them, but that curved end would work in a similar way. Basically, you bend the edge of the screen around a long piece of rubber, and then push it down into the narrow slot which runs the length of the frame. The doubled-up material then stays put because it’s jammed in there tight.
This guy calls it a “Spline tool.”
That could be a really good implement to keep people chatting as a politician going door-to-door asking for votes. Get the gentleman of the house to the door, talk to him about your kids, and/or dog, and how they also push on your screen door, and show him how to use it to fix the screen while you also chat about the coroners position. Leave the tool behind to remind him you’re his buddy.
I could see it working. . .
Hmmm… asymmetric handle with weird holes for no obvious purpose – I can totally see where the designer got the idea from!
NM
It strikes me as some sort of tool used to turn (maybe to adjust) something on some once common but now obscure piece of machinery or appliance. The triangular holes would fit over protrusions on the machine allowing the user to apply greater force or avoid touching something hot.
Given that this was (apparently) a promotional giveaway item for a political campaign, it wouldn’t have been some obscure tool that few people would have a use for. It has to be something whose purpose was immediately obvious and which was useful to the general public. I haven’t seen any compelling suggestions so far that fit that, and it’s hard to believe that something that would have been immediately obvious to Joe Blow in 1928 is completely unrecognizable to all the smart people on this board 90 years later, so I’m leaning to the theory that something is missing. This is the handle of some larger contraption whose business end has been removed.
But given that this was (apparently) a promotional giveaway item for a political campaign, it wouldn’t have made sense for the campaign to have given away multi-part doo-dads. We’re in a different century now, granted, but fifty years ago, we were getting bottle openers and hot pads from our wannabe mayors, sheriffs, and dogcatchers (these days, we get refrigerator magnets).
But for the lack of any type of blade/edge, I’d be inclined to go with citrus zester. It’s pretty clearly a kitchen implement, to my eye.
Lemon zesters are also used in the kitchen for cooking. In fact I’d say that’s a more common use.
I very much doubt anyone had aluminum frame screens with a gasket to keep the mesh in place that they could use the spline tool on.
Screens were a metal mesh that was (usually) stapled onto a wooden frame. A classier screen would have the screen stapled to a narrow wood frame with a second wood frame attached on top so teh screen seemed to disappear into the wood.
I agree with markn+ that the object could be the handle of a larger device. The working end could have come off years ago.
I don’t think it’s a citrus zester. The holes don’t look like they would be good for that purpose. The edges don’t look sharp, and they don’t project in a way that would allow them to cut into a surface (even a curved one). Also, a zester would be an odd choice for campaign swag—most people don’t use zesters, and most of those who do use them only occasionally. I’d guess that only about 10% of the population would even recognize a zester.
Also agree that there’s something missing here. A rubber attachment would have rotted away, a Bakelite attachment could have cracked off. Or maybe it is as simple as some straw that made a cheap whisk broom as suggested upthread.
As a lefty, I find it interesting that if you hold it right-handed, you would hold it with the printing side facing your palm and the curvy part up. Not sure what possible use it could have in that orientation.
Whatever it is, I wish we could jplease dump the zester theory? If zesters existed in 1928, few people used them. This wasn’t the age of specialized kitchen doo-dads we have today–no strawberry hullers or egg slicers, either. People used a paring knife to do all those things. I collect vintage cookbooks, and the ones I have–1940s and 1950s–show how-to zesting photos using a sharp knife, not a zester.
Actually, if it’s a broom, the triangular holes might have been for twine to wrap around and secure the straw.
I think the zester theory is wrong because it physically wouldn’t work as a zester without raised edges to cut. But the 1928 hyptothesis is based on one person who found a reference to an election that year. It is entirely possible this item is from a different election, so don’t base too much on the date.