Friday, November 2, 2012

Rog Phillips' "The Can Opener" (short story, weird physics, free): Opening a can without puncturing it!

Illustration by T E Willis accompanying the original publication in Fantastic Adventures magazine of short story The Can Opener by Rog Phillips. Image shows the protagonist experimenting with the curious can opener.
This is one of those "mysterious man with a mysterious gadget in our middle" stories. Readable enough.

Story summary.

Joe had a colleague in office - a colleague who always brought 3 cans of food for lunch. And he kept 3 can openers in his drawer. One day, Joe noticed something peculiar. These can openers could get food from the cans without actually puncturing them!

Further investigation of it keeps getting weierder & weirder...

See also.

  1. Henry Kuttner & C L Moore's "The Proud Robot": This hilarious story features perhaps the science fiction's most famous (beer) can opener as its main gadget.

Fact sheet.

First published: Fantastic Adventures, January 1949.
Download full text as part of the scans of the magazine it originally appeared in.
Rating: B.
Related: Stories of Rog Phillips.

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