US 5,561,905 AGranted

Letter opener

OwnerAlan E. Shermaninventor

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Abstract

A letter opener includes a handle portion, a depending neck portion, and oppositely extending tine portions carried by the neck portion. A cutting edge is mounted on each side of the neck portion such that either of the tine portions can be inserted under the flap of a sealed envelope and moved across the envelope to permit the respective cutting edge to slice open the envelope. Since the novel letter opener according to the invention includes two cutting edges, the useful life of the letter opener is doubled over the useful life of prior art, single cutting edge letter openers. Inasmuch as the letter opener may carry one or more informational messages, such as advertising messages, postal rate information, etc., the length of time the messages are exposed to the user is also doubled, thereby doubling the value of the letter opener to both the user as well as those employing the letter opener as a medium of communication to the user.

Claims11

Dependent claims

A letter opener comprising:

a main body portion adapted to be utilized as a handle:
a neck portion depending from said main body portion;
first and second tine portions extending from said neck portion, each of said tine portions having a free end portion on the opposite end thereof from said neck portion, and said free end portions of said tine portions being formed such that either of said free end portions of said tine portions can be inserted under the flap of a sealed envelope:
and
a first cutting edge held adjacent said first tine portion with said first cutting edge being generally directed toward the free end portion of said first tine portion;
and a second cutting edge held adjacent said second tine portion with said second cutting edge being generally directed toward the free end portion of said second tine portion;
whereas either of said first and second tine portions can be inserted under the flap of a sealed envelope and moved across the envelope to permit a respective cutting edge to slice open the envelope.

4 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.