Author: PETROSKI, HENRY
Title: The toothpick : technology and culture
Description: New York : Alfred A. Knopf 2007. First Edition. An exceptional copy; fine in an equally fine dw. now mylar-sleeved. Particularly and surprisingly well-preserved; tight. bright. clean and especially sharp-cornered. Literally as new.; 443 pages; Description: xii. 443 p. : ill. ; 25 cm. Includes bibliographical references (p. 355-414) and index. Subjects: Toothpicks. SUMMARY: Like The Pencil. Henry Petroski's The Toothpick is a celebration of a humble yet elegant device. As old as mankind and as universal as eating. this useful and ubiquitous tool finally gets its due in this wide-ranging and compulsively readable book. Here is the unexpected story of the simplest of implements-whether made of grass. gold. quill. or wood-a story of engineering and design. of culture and class. and a lesson in how to discover the extraordinary in the ordinary. Petroski takes us back to ancient Rome. where the emperor Nero makes his entrance into a banquet hall with a silver toothpick in his mouth; and to a more recent time in Spain. where a young señorita uses the delicately pointed instrument to protect her virtue from someone trying to steal a kiss. He introduces us to Charles Forster. a nineteenth-century Bostonian and father of the American toothpick industry. who hires Harvard students to demand toothpicks in area restaurants-thereby making their availability in eating establishments as expected as condiments. And Petroski takes us inside the surprisingly secretive toothpick-manufacturing industry. in which one small town's factories can turn out 200 million wooden toothpicks a day using methods that. except for computer controls. haven't changed much in almost 150 years. He also explores a treasure trove of the toothpick's unintended uses and perils. from sandwiches to martinis and beyond. With an engineer's eye for detail and a poet's flair for language. Petroski has earned his reputation as a writer who explains our world-from the tallest buildings to the lowliest toothpick-to us. by Henry Petroski.Weight in Kg appr.:

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