Recently, people on the internet worked together to figure out what happened to an old cooking tool. But have you ever thought about where this useful tool came from? Let’s go back in time to learn more about the interesting past of the kitchen mixer.
Around the middle of the 1800s, people started patenting different types of mixers. In 1856, a tinner from Baltimore named Ralph Collier invented the first mixer with parts that could turn. Soon after, in 1857, E.P. Griffith brought the whisk to England. In 1859, the Monroe brothers brought their hand-turned rotary egg beater to the US.
The Dover Stamping Company made egg beaters very famous, and their Dover egg beaters are now known all over the world. Recipes from that time show that the term “Dover beater” was well known by 1929.
Over time, creative people kept making the style better. In 1870, Turner Williams made a new model, and in 1884, Willis Johnson invented even more improvements. When Rufus Eastman made the first electric mixer in 1885, it changed everything.
Commercial mixers became popular in the early 1900s, with Hobart Manufacturing Company being the first to make them. Their model from 1914 changed the business, and by the 1920s, electric mixers were common in home kitchens everywhere.
Herbert Johnston, an engineer from Hobart, got the idea for his invention by watching a cook use a metal spoon to mix dough for bread. In 1908, the electric standing mixer was made because of this. It was common for big bakers to have his 20-gallon mixer by 1915.
Hobart made the Kitchen Aid Food Preparer for home use in 1919. It was a big step forward in the history of the kitchen mixer. Sunbeam’s Mixmaster, which came out in 1910, was another innovative brand that made mixing easier and faster.
We don’t think twice about how useful and easy to use our cooking mixers are these days. But their past shows how creative and resourceful people can be. They have changed how we cook and eat food.
