Lazy Susan

A lazy Susan is a turntable (rotating tray) placed on a table or countertop to aid in distributing food. Lazy Susans may be made from a variety of materials but are usually glass, wood, or plastic. They are circular and placed in the centre of a table to share dishes easily among diners. Although they are common in Chinese restaurants, the lazy Susan is not a Chinese-American invention. Owing to the nature of Chinese cuisine, especially dim sum, they are common at formal Chinese restaurants both in mainland China and abroad. In Chinese, they are known as (t. 餐桌轉盤) (p cānzhuō zhuànpán) or "dinner-table turntables". History It is likely that the explanation of the term lazy Susan has been lost to history. Folk etymologies claim it as an American invention. According to lore, Thomas Jefferson invented the device, which was known as a "dumbwaiter", for his daughter Susan. Regardless of the origins of the name, by 1917 it was advertised in Vanity Fair as "Ovington's $8.50 mahogany 'Revolving Server or Lazy Susan'", but the term's use predates both the advertisement and, probably, the country. Part of the mystery arises from the variety of devices that were grouped under the term "dumb waiter" (today written dumbwaiter). An early 18th-century British article in The Gentleman's Magazine describes how silent machines had replaced garrulous servants at some tables and, by the 1750s, Christopher Smart was praising the "foreign" but discreet devices in verse. It is, however, almost certain that the devices under discussion were wheeled serving trays similar to those introduced by Thomas Jefferson to the United States from France, where they were known as étagères. At some point during or before the third quarter of the 18th century, the name dumb waiter also began to be applied to rotating trays. (Jefferson never had a lazy Susan at Monticello, but he did construct a box-shaped rotating book stand and, as part of serving "in the French style", employed a revolving dining-room door whose reverse side supported a number of shelves.). By the 1840s, Americans were applying the term to small lifts carrying food between floors as well. The success of George W. Cannon's 1887 mechanical dumbwaiter popularised this usage, replacing the previous meanings of "dumbwaiter". The lazy Susan was initially uncommon enough in the United States for the utopianist Oneida Community to be credited with its invention.