Portable Electric Mixer (Osterett) - Syracuse University Libraries Digital Collections

Title

Portable Electric Mixer (Osterett)

Date of Original

1952

Format of Original

["Artifacts (object genre)"]

Source Collection

["Plastics Artifacts Collection"]

Object Details

Title

Portable Electric Mixer (Osterett)

Description

White plastic casing containing motorized electric parts. "Powerful, Portable, Electric Mixer" is in original packaging with instructions. Designed by Alfonso Iannelli (1888-1965), this portable mixer allowed the 1950s housewife to cook up storm anywhere in the kitchen, from the stove to the breakfast table. The Osterett was the smallest and simplest design of several Oster's portable mixers, which had first been introduced in the mid-1930s. The Osterett used more plastic and thus weighed much less (only 2 pounds) than its predecessors. According to David Hanks and Anne Hoy, "Its bullet-shaped body echoes the simplest form of a high-speed train engine, emphasized by the raised horizontal band around the middle and the vertical perforated lines at the end. In place of a train searchlight , a Phillips head screw secures the two halves, and the script lettering 'Osterett' is placed were a train name would be." Iannelli was an established designer. He designed sculpture for Frank Lloyd Wright's Midway Gardens (1913-14) and while he continued to work as a sculptor, he was also busy as industrial designer, notably for Sunbeam, from the 1920s on.

See: David A. Hanks and Anne Hoy, American Streamlined Design: The World of Tomorrow (Paris: Flammarion, 2005), pp.135-137, 254)

Date of Original

1952

Subjects (Plastics Pioneers)

["Appliances","Kitchenware"]

Manufacturer

["John Oster Manufacturing Company"]

Type

["Physical object"]

Format of Original

["Artifacts (object genre)"]

Material

["Cellulosics","Metal","Cellulosics--Cellulose Acetate (CA)"]

Process

["Unidentified"]

Source Collection

["Plastics Artifacts Collection"]

Finding Aid

View the Plastics Artifacts Collection finding aid

MMS ID

9940932883408496

Catalog Record Link

View the catalog record

Rights Status

["Copyright Not Evaluated"]

Accession Number

2009_079.057

Quartex ID

plastics_art_02835

Item Details

Title

Date of Original

1952

Type

[ "Physical object" ]