1900's pen knives

G

grins000

Joined
Jun 28, 2008
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374
I hope I have posted this in the right forum, I have this early pen knife, about 2 1/2" in length, just purchased off the auction place, and am wondering what these tiny knives would have been used for and what type person might have carried them. Thank you in advance.
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Yep right forum. Probably used to cut stuff. The historians will be along shortly.

But I'll start by saying that it's not a working mans daily knife :)
 
Pen-knives were originally used for making pens out of goose quills. We're probably in steel-nib days by 1900, though.
 
Oh, I imagine that a city fella would carry a small pen knife to do much the same thing as we do today. Cut things like string, open mail, open boxes, sharpen a pencil. Life in the early 1900's was getting pretty tame. No more great herds of buffalo to shoot and skin, no more wild injuns out to lift your hair. The beaver trade was long long gone. You could get on a train in New York and take it all the way to the city by the bay, San Francisco. Downright civilized, with no need of a bowie knife for edc. Kind of like nowadays.

Why I hear tell that today some folks walk around with a little Case peanut as their edc.

:D

Carl.
 
Might have to see a picture of the knife to have more ideas on the intended use.

To post pictures, upload them to a photohosting site such as Photobucket. From there, if the site provides IMG codes, insert the IMG code in your post. If the site does not provide IMG codes, you can take the web address of the pic and manually enclose it thus,
 
I hadda laugh when I saw the title of this thread - "1900's pen knives". Like it was the last century!!!! What a hoot. Oh, wait a minute - it was the last century. In the context of the question, it kinda makes me feel old since I was born in 1943. Had he lived, my Dad would have been 100 years old on 7 December of this year. Dang!! The clock is ticking.

As to the pen knife, they are great little knives and the one pictured is very nice. I liked "jackknife's" response.
 
Is there a maker's mark on your knife? It looks German with the large German silver bolsters, steel pins and small mop piece.
 
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