I do not possess a television, so while I was spared the visual ugliness of yesterday's Cleveland Browns' very ugly "winning ugly" first (sole?) victory of the year, I had to endure about a baker's dozen repetitions of a radio ad for Smuckers Uncrustables (which truly are very good but not THAT good) in which the homespun announcer claims that said PB&J concoction (and let's face it, if we've come to the point where we have to have somebody else make and then freeze our PB&J sandwiches for us, Nero's Rome ain't got nothing on us except maybe better taste in togas) is (Smucker's Uncrsutables, that is) the proverbially greatest thing since sliced bread. The time is nigh to (in the words of my AP English teacher) "unpack" that proverbial phrase a bit.
First, though bread, and its many synonyms and off-shoots (AKA manna), does appear with some frequency in the Bible, I do not recall the phrase "sliced bread" appearing in the Book of Proverbs, so to label the phrase "proverbial" is an error on my part. My apologies.
B) It goes without saying that just as there have been many "things" that have come along since the advent of sliced bread (more on which later) and have made the (not completely unwarranted claim, for many of them) claim that they are indeed the greatest thing since sliced bread, there are certainly many "things" that have come along since the advent of sliced bread (ibid.) that could very arguably have been validated truly as the "greatest thing" since sliced bread, even if they, or no one else, have not made the claim (and assuming there is actually an entity--czar or otherwise--that has the power to validate such things). I offer any remote control devices, chocolate-dipped potato chips, and the Slinky as a mere off-the-top-of-my-head list of viable greatest things since (yes, I do have a bias, not being one who--despite my love of toast and homemade PB&Js--thinks all that much of the achievement of sliced bread, but in admitting that bias and working hard to overcome it, I strive to be as objective here as possible; I mean, come on, sliced bread folks; we can't do better than that?). The point though, I think, is that until something comes along that truly wows us all, including the guardians of acceptable proverbial (speaking extra-biblically here) phrases, to the point that we as a collective people start using a different "thing" of comparison, sliced bread is the de facto greatest thing.
Enough semantics. I give you Otto Frederick Rohwedder of humble Davenport, Iowa. He's the one to simultaneously praise/scourge. Rohwedder, perhaps in a lifelong attempt to overcome his unfortunate name, was the man responsible for inventing the automatic bread slicer (any Davenportians out there? Can you please confirm the existence of a Rhowedder Avenue in your parts? There must be some recognition of this pioneer in his hometown. Do people around Iowa say things like, "Oh, the Davenport Rohwedders" [while making slicing motions with their hands] with a mixture of awe and envy in their voices?). The thing that intrigues me, though, is that according to the folks who know all things webbish, Rohwedder's prototype bread slicer was destroyed in a fire in 1912! Not being an engineer, and granting that if it took until the 20th century to invent a bread-slicing machine there must be a lot more to slicing bread automatically than meets my eye, I still find it hard to believe that it took Mr. Rohwedder sixteen years to get over the smoldering ruins of his prototype enough to come up with another one (unless there was some unsliced bread mafia operating in Davenport putting the, um, heat on him).
Though despite his sluggishness, maybe Rohwedder isn't fully to blame for the proverbial phrase "the greatest thing since slice bread." It turns out that after successfully debuting his slicer on 7/7/28 (an auspicious date, don't you think, numerologists?), the slicer was marketed as the very apt and very modest "greatest thing to happen to the baking industry since bread was wrapped." Fair enough, and who doesn't appreciate wrapped bread? Lo and behold, it was Wonder Bread, in the Depression-starved (in more ways than one, certainly the use of hyperbole) 1930s who launched an ad campaign with the "greatest thing since sliced bread" line (my work for the CIA prohibits me from saying anything more about Wonder Bread than relating this story: twenty years ago I visited an abbey, where the monks bake--and slice--amazing bread; alas, the wheat they grow at the abbey is not good enough for their own bread; they sell the wheat to Wonder Bread; the monk who told me this said, as dryly as any monk could, "Wonder Bread, it's a wonder people eat it").
So there you have it, a slice of bread history. But all this prelude, because, frankly, as long as it's not moldy and of the ultra-thin, diet, wheat variety, I don't think much about bread. It's that damned phrase, the greatest thing since sliced bread, that irks me. What I really wanted to discover was what were the previous "greatest things since x" before sliced bread usurped the throne? In my research, I discovered a host of surprises, a few non-surprises, and inevitably a schism along religious lines (can't we just all get along?). Herewith, then, the history of the greatest things since (pre-sliced bread era), divided into Evolutionist and Creationist lists.
Evolutionist
Big Bang > amoeba: "That's the greatest thing since that loud explosion."
Amoeba > Lucy (humankind's progenitor, not Van Pelt or Ricardo): "That's the greatest thing since raw meat (figuratively speaking for at least a few eons)."
Lucy > the discovery of fire: "That's the greatest thing since we discovered our thumbs are opposable."
The discovery of fire > two weeks after the beginning of theatrical performance: "That's the greatest thing since medium rare red meat."
Two weeks after the beginning of theatrical performance > three weeks after the beginning of theatrical performance: "That's the greatest thing since realizing you can throw tomatos at bad thespians."
Three weeks after the beginning of theatrical performance > The Dark Ages: "That's the greatest thing since catsup/ketchup."
The Dark Ages > The Age of Enlightenment: "That's the greatest thing I've been able to see in Ages."
The Age of Enlightenment > 1864: "That's the greatest thing since French bread (unsliced though it may be)."
1864 > that Wonder Bread ad circa 1930s: "That's the greatest thing since sideburns."
** It must be said that there's a small but powerful sect in Maine who've never bought the sliced bread thing. Outside of the sixteen months commencing on May 10, 1975, and ending in September 1976, when these Mainesters (Maineians? Mainers? Those Who Hail From Maine? Them?) used the phrase, "That's the greatest thing since the SONY Beta max," they have stuck proudly to the phrase "Greatest thing since the lobster bib, yeah," since God knows when.
***Also, universally since recorded time, ninth grade students at all-boys schools, because the phrase "that's the greatest thing since breasts" is to them a non sequitur, as in, nothing can compare to the idea or sight of breasts, they linguistically find it impossible to utter the phrase "that's the greatest thing since" so they are left to say, upon encountering anything like a loud car, a plate of french fries, an unattended keg, or a Van Halen guitar solo, merely, "Sweet!"
Creationist
"Let There Be Light" > "Get Out of Eden, You Two": not applicable, since everything was the greatest.
"Get Out of Eden, You Two" > the invention of the loom: "That's the greatest thing since unashamed nudity."
The invention of the loom > that Wonder Bread ad, circa 1930s: "That's the greatest thing since underwear."
Intelligent Design
Since the term "intelligent design" has only been in use since 1987, there is no pre-sliced bread history to excavate, and though many intelligent designers (including Versace and Hilfiger) are heard to use the phrase, "that's the greatest thing since intelligent design," the jury's still out on that one.
Now if only my golf slice were as easy to analyze.
The Newbeats-Bread and Butter
Bob Dylan & The Band-Yea! Heavy And A Bottle Of Bread
And what was the greatest thing BEFORE sliced bread?
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