The army's greatest invention… is a can opener

I found a box of these strange, 1.5″ metal devices at American Science and Surplus in the military / outdoors section tagged as “can openers.” Seeing as AS&S tends towards humorous descriptions, I thought it was a joke. They resembled door hinges more than can openers. Intrigued, I bought a handful at $0.40 each and then went home to my laptop to see how one is supposed to use these simple bits of metal to rip open a steel can.

Apparently it’s official name is OPENER, CAN, HAND, FOLDING, TYPE I but it’s been nicknamed the P-38, supposedly because it takes 38 punctures to open a can of C-Rations. They were distributed to soldiers in WWII and the Korean War but when the C-Rations where replaced by foil-packaged MREs in the 1980s, there was no reason to provide p-38s and they disappeared into obscurity.

Besides this little gadget being useful for nostalgic reasons for soldiers who served in wars before 1980, it’s been co-opted for other tasks such as opening bottles, scaling fish, stripping wire, gapping spark plugs and more. And it’s environmentally friendly: the manufacturing process requires very little in terms of raw materials and labor, its light weight means it requires less fuel to transport, it’s solid design means it won’t have to be replaced any time soon, and since it’s human-powered it requires zero electricity.

You can read more about the p-38 here:
Specifications
P-38 Can Opener
The Army’s Greatest Invention