A Swiss Army knife is a useful multifunction tool. It is a small knife with many other tools, such as a toothpick, scissors, serrated knife, tweezers; these are folded into the handle of the knife and are unfolded for use. Many different types of Swiss army knives are available, but not all are the genuine thing.
There are two Swiss Army knife manufacturers, Victorinox and Wenger; they supply about 50,000 knives total to the Swiss army each year. The rest of production is devoted to exports, mostly to the United States.
In 1891, Victorinox founder Karl Elsener started supplying the Swiss army with knives actually made in Switzerland, as opposed to Germany. The original had a wooden handle (as opposed to the plastic/metal composites seen today), and featured a blade, a screwdriver, a can opener, and a punch. Later, in 1897, Elsener developed a version that used a special spring mechanism that allowed more tools to fit in the same size handle. [1]
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