20

Austria

In 1966, a young inventor from Vienna, Gero Artmer, began

producing his "Gero" cork ejector. He applied for an

Austrian patent September 10, 1965 and number 260,058

was granted in February 1968. The all-metal Gero is a

rather ingenious design, which comes as a 5" x 7/8" cylinder.

The needle stores in the end of the piston. Unscrew it, turn

it around, thread it onto the piston, and it is ready for work.

In a departure from the norm in air ejectors, the hole in the

needle is drilled completely through near the tip allowing air

to exit on both sides.

In a bit of tongue-in-cheek German advertising, the Gero

was offered as "A versatile heavy duty machine with

countless possibilities - removing pearls from oysters,

repelling man-eating fish, spindling postage stamps, smuggling

diamonds, eating pomegranates, and tattooing…and finally,

it can quickly, cleanly and easily open a 1922 bottle of Chateau d'Yquem Premier Grand

Crus."

In England Artmer's product was sold as the "Cork-up deluxe - The Modern Cork-

Screwer one possesses." Instructions caution the user to wrap a napkin around the

bottle and never use it to open bottles containing spirits. By the 1970s sales had slowed

and in 1971, production ended. During the five year period 195,000 pieces had been

manufactured in eight colors.