# Origin of "Is it bigger than a breadbox?"

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox/245317>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 15, 2004, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox/245317 "2004-05-15T20:38:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![svd678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/53a042/32.png) [@svd678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/svd678)\
**Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox/245317/41 "2017-02-05T04:17:19Z")

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I’m rather sure that the question is it bigger than a breadbox goes back to the era when people would sit around the living room playing Twenty Question with voice alone, decades before TV and maybe before radio.

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**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\
**Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox/245317/42 "2017-02-05T15:13:51Z")

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> [@svd678](#):
>
> I’m rather sure that the question is it bigger than a breadbox goes back to the era when people would sit around the living room playing Twenty Question with voice alone, decades before TV and maybe before radio.

How do you know this? “I’ve got a feeling” doesn’t count.

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**Author:** ![D.E.S.K.Top668](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f07891/32.png) [@D.E.S.K.Top668](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D.E.S.K.Top668)\
**Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox/245317/43 "2017-02-05T21:58:54Z")

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> [@samclem](#):
>
> A breadbox was a vented, metal cabinet about 18-24 inches long, 12 inches high, and 12-18 inches wide. About the size of a very modern, average microwave oven.

My mum has a breadbox that she’s had for30+ years, made of wood with a glass window in the door. It was unvented and was the same width as a microwave, but was shorter and skinnier then that.  
Funny story (to me) about it She got it at a flea market for ten dollars when the exact same ones were twenty-five dollars. The others had “BREAD” etched into the glass in Old English and the one she got had what looked like a foreign language etched into it. We had it two years before we realized the glass said “BREAD” in Old English but had been installed upside down and backwards.:smack:

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**Author:** ![barbitu8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/839c29/32.png) [@barbitu8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/barbitu8)\
**Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox/245317/44 "2017-02-05T23:47:08Z")

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My breadbox is a modern one. Completely plasticwith a tight seal and smaller than the old ones.

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**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\
**Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/origin-of-is-it-bigger-than-a-breadbox/245317/45 "2017-02-06T00:29:04Z")

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Steve Allen’s first reference to a breadbox on What’s My Line, January 18th 1953.

[Is it a large product if you accepted the norm, something the size of a breadbox let’s say?](https://youtu.be/fyAcgQF5O-I?t=1440)

The fact that he put the question in this form suggests that he did indeed originate it, amending it in later shows to the familiar shortened version.

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