A
spork or a
foon is a hybrid form of
cutleryCutlery refers to any hand implement used in preparing, serving, and especially eating food in the Western world. It is more usually known as silverware or flatware in the United States, where cutlery can have the more specific meaning of knives and other cutting instruments. This is probably the...
taking the form of a
spoonA spoon is a utensil consisting of a small shallow bowl, oval or round, at the end of a handle. A type of cutlery , especially as part of a place setting, it is used primarily for serving. Spoons are also used in food preparation to measure, mix, stir and toss ingredients...
-like shallow scoop with three or four
forkAs a piece of cutlery or kitchenware, a fork is a tool consisting of a handle with several narrow tines on one end. The fork, as an eating utensil, has been a feature primarily of the West, whereas in East Asia chopsticks have been more prevalent...
tines. Spork-like utensils, such as the terrapin fork or ice cream fork, have been manufactured since the late 1800s;
patentA patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for a public disclosure of an invention....
s for spork-like designs date back to at least 1874, and the word "spork" was registered as a
trademarkA trademark or trade mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or services from...
in the US and the UK decades later. They are used by fast food restaurants, schools, prisons, the military and backpackers.
The
spork is a portmanteau word combining
spoon and
fork.
Sporks, for those of you who have been spared, are the dreaded half-spoon, half-fork utensils handed out by some fast-food places that have tines too short to spear anything but are strategically placed to make sure anything liquid winds up on your necktie, blouse, shirt or navel - depending on your choice of attire.
Jan Glidewell|Jan Glidewell, St. Petersburg Times, July 28, 1996.
Get away from me fat man, or I'll spork your ass.
TV show The Critic
A
spork or a
foon is a hybrid form of
cutleryCutlery refers to any hand implement used in preparing, serving, and especially eating food in the Western world. It is more usually known as silverware or flatware in the United States, where cutlery can have the more specific meaning of knives and other cutting instruments. This is probably the...
taking the form of a
spoonA spoon is a utensil consisting of a small shallow bowl, oval or round, at the end of a handle. A type of cutlery , especially as part of a place setting, it is used primarily for serving. Spoons are also used in food preparation to measure, mix, stir and toss ingredients...
-like shallow scoop with three or four
forkAs a piece of cutlery or kitchenware, a fork is a tool consisting of a handle with several narrow tines on one end. The fork, as an eating utensil, has been a feature primarily of the West, whereas in East Asia chopsticks have been more prevalent...
tines. Spork-like utensils, such as the terrapin fork or ice cream fork, have been manufactured since the late 1800s;
patentA patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for a public disclosure of an invention....
s for spork-like designs date back to at least 1874, and the word "spork" was registered as a
trademarkA trademark or trade mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or services from...
in the US and the UK decades later. They are used by fast food restaurants, schools, prisons, the military and backpackers.
The
spork is a portmanteau word combining
spoon and
fork. Similarly, the word
foon is a blend of
fork and
spoon. The word
"spork" appeared in the 1909 supplement to the
Century DictionaryThe Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia was one of the largest and most highly regarded encyclopedic dictionaries of the English language. The first edition was published from 1889 to 1891 by The Century Company of New York, in six, eight, or ten volume versions in 7,046 pages with some 10,000...
, where it was described as a
trade nameA trade name, also known as a trading name or a business name, is the name which a business trades under for commercial purposes, although its registered, legal name, used for contracts and other formal situations, may be another....
and "a 'portmanteau-word' applied to a long, slender spoon having, at the end of the bowl, projections resembling the tines of a fork".
History
Sporks have been mass-manufactured since at least the late 1800s. The Folgate Silver Plate Company of England manufactured one sometime between 1875 and 1900.
In the US, patents for sporks and proto-sporks have been issued. A combined spoon, fork, and knife closely resembling the modern spork was invented by Samuel W. Francis and issued US Patent 147,119 in February 1874. Other early patents predating the modern spork include US Patent 904,553, for a "Cutting spoon", granted on November 24, 1908 to Harry L. McCoy and US Patent 1,044,869, for a spoon with a tined edge, granted to Frank Emmenegger in November 1912. Many of these inventions predated the use of the term "spork" and thus may be considered proto-sporks. Given this significant prior art, the basic concept of combining aspects of a spoon and fork is well established; more modern patents have limited themselves to the specific implementation and appearance of the spork. These
design patentIn the United States, a design patent is a patent granted on the ornamental design of a functional item. Design patents are a type of industrial design right. Ornamental designs of jewelry, furniture, beverage containers and computer icons are examples of objects that are covered by design...
s do not prevent anyone from designing and manufacturing their own version of a spork. Examples of modern US design patents for sporks include patent number D247,153 issued in February 1978 and patent D388,664 issued in January 1998.
The
word spork
originatedA neologism ; from Greek νές is a newly coined word that may be in the process of entering common use, but has not yet been accepted into mainstream language. Neologisms are often directly attributable to a specific person, publication, period, or event...
in the early 1900s to describe such devices. According to a December 20, 1952
New York Times article, Hyde W. Ballard of
Westtown, PennsylvaniaWesttown Township is a township in Chester County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 10,352 at the 2000 census.-Geography:According to the United States Census Bureau, the township has a total area of 8.8 square miles , of which, 8.7 square miles of it is land and...
filed an application to register "Spork" as a
trademarkA trademark or trade mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or services from...
for a combination spoon and fork made of stainless steel, although there is no longer any record of this application at the
United States Patent and Trademark OfficeThe United States Patent and Trademark Office is an agency in the United States Department of Commerce that issues patents to inventors and businesses for their inventions, and trademark registration for product and intellectual property identification.The USPTO is currently based in Alexandria,...
. The Van Brode Milling Company subsequently registered SPORK for a combination plastic spoon, fork and knife at the USPTO on October 27, 1970, but abandoned the registration several years later. The word Spork accompanied by a stylised design is registered in the US in relation to hand tools, in the name of a UK based individual (reg. no. 2514381).
In the UK, Plastico Limited registered Spork as a trademark in relation to cutlery with effect from September 18, 1975 (reg. no. 1052291). The registration is now in the name of another company and remains in force. The trademark is also registered in the UK in relation to gardening tools in the name of the same UK based individual who owns US trademark registration no. 2514381. Another British company, Lifeventure, sells
titaniumTitanium is a chemical element with the symbol Ti and atomic number 22. Sometimes called the “space age metal”, it has a low density and is a strong, lustrous, corrosion-resistant transition metal with a silver color.Titanium can be alloyed with iron, aluminium, vanadium, molybdenum, among other...
and plastic versions using the name "Forkspoon".
In an unsuccessful
lawsuitA lawsuit is a civil action brought before a court of law in which a plaintiff, a party who claims to have received damages from a defendant's actions, seeks a legal or equitable remedy. The defendant is required to respond to the plaintiff's complaint...
in 1999 where the company Regalzone sought to invalidate Plastico Limited's UK registration for Spork, Justice Neuberger wrote: "I accept that the word
Spork involves a clever idea of making a single word by eliding the end of the word spoon and beginning of the word fork. The fact that it is clever and the fact that the meaning of
Spork could be said to be obvious once it is explained does not mean that it is obvious what it is. Indeed, I would have thought that if one asked a person in 1975 what a Spork was, he or she would not know. If one then explained what it was and how the word came about, one might then be told that it was obvious or that it was clever."
Materials and uses
Materials such as stainless steel, silver, aluminum, titanium, and
polycarbonatePolycarbonates are a particular group of thermoplastic polymers. They are easily worked, moulded, and thermoformed; as such, these plastics are very widely used in the modern chemical industry. Their interesting features position them between commodity plastics and engineering plastics...
plastic have been used in spork manufacture. Plastic sporks are common in prisons in the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
because they are difficult to form into
weaponsA shiv is a slang term for any sharp or pointed implement used as a knife-like weapon, including knives themselves. However, the word in practical usage is frequently used when referring to an improvised bladed weapon. Shivs are commonly made by inmates in prisons across the world...
. Prepackaged meals may come with a disposable plastic spork.
External links