That is what they look like now. Up until the early eighties they looked like this: http://www.google.com/imgres?hl=en&biw=1054&bih=511&gbv=2&tbm=isch&tbnid=KLjU93wQV17WAM:&imgrefurl=http://www.wolfstad.com/2007/10/old-fashioned-cans-with-pull-tabs-still-used-around-the-world-after-30-years/&docid=58rwTt8ky5cCNM&imgurl=http://www.wolfstad.com/wp-content/2007/egypt-coke-can.jpg&w=425&h=577&ei=Vj0YT5XSKcLg0QHJz4HOCw&zoom=1
Life used to be more dangerous.
Edit. A few people beat me to the punch.
I hated those things. I pretty much always had to find something to use to push them in, especially the little one for the air hole. BTW, it was called a push button can. This site shows the different types and when they were used:
Wikipedia mentions attempts at introducing pull-tabs in the 1920s and says that “later advancements saw the ends of the can made out of aluminium instead of steel.”
This 17% figure might have been true years ago for old cans where only the top was aluminum, but clearly it isn’t a reasonable claim for an all-aluminum can.
I should have added :p.
I was going to say that, too. But I believe those mostly consist of tiny, TINY, pieces of translucent plastic. Think if you shredded a plastic bag really small.
I am too young to remember those, but I do remember when SPAM had them. I think those are mostly gone, in favor of the “giant pull tab” style like on cat food?
I think you’re talking about these, but I think that post was referring to one of these as a church key.
I seem to remember that lots of soda machines had a bin where you could deposit the pull tabs.
However they were new fangled. When I was a kid we went on picnics and brought cone top soda cans which you twisted off. I’m not sure if I remember Coke coming that way, I know orange soda did.
I remember badly cutting my big toe on one of these that was sticking up on a lake shore.
Yeah, I’m glad these things are not part of current packaging techniques.
There was a lot of talk at the time about the wildlife interaction with pull-tabs. I think people believed that deer, especially, would eat these and then suffer gastrointestinal damage and death.
Let me check.
… Spent five minutes and the entire ‘why recycle tabs / do they really do to charity’ debate/answers made my search difficult.
And I’m trying to eat dinner.
Yeah… that’s the reason.
I thought the pull tab openers were changed because they could be made into ad-hoc weapons: a few pull tabs on your fingers and you had instant brass knuckles. Or at least that’s what someone told me…
I blame my family perhaps, using that name. But even “church key” is kind of a shibboleth for over a certain age, as most people just call it a “bottle opener”, referring to the pointy end on those.
I made the same mistake as him at first.
Only things I remember with the “church key” would be large cans of things like Hawaiian Punch or Hi-C or maybe some of the less common fruit juices, like pineapple.
It was never called “church key” in our house, it was just “can opener”. Had to determine by context whether you meant that one or the one to open soup cans.
Damn, that does bring back some memories. But only with large cans like TBG says.
Okay, I am definitely confusing my devices but have it straight now: A “church key” is the unwieldy tool with a big butterfly-looking “winder” that allows you to open a can around the rim. In our house, we just called it a “can opener.” We still use one to open cans of sweetened condensed milk over here. That small, long object with the triangular puncher used to open holes in large cans of juice, I’m not sure what that was called. Church keys often had one at the end of one hande.
No, you still seem confused. These are all examples of church keys. The one you’re thinking of is sometimes called a butterfly can opener. Many of them have a church key at the end of one handle.
It is a little known fact that you could use the (nearly) circular parts in a lot of vending machines and parking meters as dimes. I guess the industry wasn’t very concerned about people using counterfeit coins.
Okay. Got it now. Fond childhood memories of church keys.
I’m old enough to not only remember when beverage cans needed openers, I remember when pull tabs were first introduced. The Pittsburgh Brewing Company introduced them on cans of Iron City Beer in 1962. I grew up in Western Pennsylvania and remember advertisements for the new cans during Pittsburgh Pirates games on TV.
People don’t still have those on their fridges? I have one. OK, I only use it to open cans of evaporated milk for the 3 recipes I use that call for it, but I have one and it’s on my fridge!
So, before then, you had to use a can opener to drink a beer? Did people drink beer directly out of the can, in those days?
Did they ever! Sometimes the price would be stamped on top of the can with blue ink. It was a dead giveaway to have blue ink on your nose.
