Knitting machine:Kenner's New Automatic Knitting Machine

In the social turmoil of the 1960s, some Americans longed for a simple, less materialistic lifestyle. These proponents of the counterculture sought to escape their urban roots, take up life on the farm, and live more "authentically" by making--with their own hands--the foods, clothing, and materials they needed. The counterculturists and others influenced by them cultivated an appreciation for homecrafts and handmade goods and designs including candles, textiles, pottery, leather goods, batik and tie-dyed decorations, and macrame. It was perhaps the influence of the popularity of homecrafts that inspired Kenner to make an automatic knitting machine. The Knit-o-matic device provided a homecraft aesthetic for the adults who purchased the loom, but the convenience of machinery ensured that the children who wove on it wouldn't neccessarily be frustrated by the tedium of the task. The knitting machine, too, might be seen as renewing a generations-old tradition of young girls learning the textile-production and sewing skills they would need as adults and providers of the family clothing.