A List of Iconic/Groundbreaking Traditional Knives

Neeman's comment about Hollywood made me wonder about the Jimmy Lile original Rambo knife. Was it ground breaking at the time?
It sure has spawned a lot of copies, counterfeits and hybrids!
 
Neeman - I said 150 years as a time period to choose from within. I don't mean knives or designs that have held up for the entire 150 year period. I just meant designs and knives that are newer than 150 years because commercial knifemaking wasn't really a thing until the industrial revolution picked up. There were knifemakers from before that time who had a reputation, but mass production and wide scale adoption were pretty much impossible.
 
ckpj99 said:
So, a running list so far:

Actual Knives
Swiss Army Knife - took a recognizable form before WWII
Mercator
Opinel
Buck 110
Douk-Douk
TL-29

Patterns
Lambsfoot
Trapper
Barlow
Stockman
Sodbuster
Italian Switchblade Pattern
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Personally, I think actual knives are iconic, patterns, however good, are just patterns. You have to go back to the start. There was an original Barlow knife, and maybe there was with some of the other patterns too.

knarfeng said:
I modified the title. Including the word "traditional" usually reduces the number of barbarian incursions.
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:D :thumbup:

black mamba said:
Neeman's comment about Hollywood made me wonder about the Jimmy Lile original Rambo knife. Was it ground breaking at the time?
It sure has spawned a lot of copies, counterfeits and hybrids!
Click to expand...

Not ground-breaking for me, IMO it was a movie prop that spawned lots of ugly copies. However, I think there's a case to regard it as iconic.
 
Edit - slegged.
 

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pmew said:
Now that its fixed blades too, The Fairbairn-Sykes is back in then

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First manufactured by Wilkinson Sword in 1941 and used extensively by royal marine commandos in the Normandy Landings of 1944.
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I had a pattern 3...What a piece of junk!...Probably pierce the skin of a rice pudding without fear of snapping it...Rat tail tang and weak in an aluminium handle...Fairbairn apologised for it because of the shortage of brass it changed the whole balance dynamics of it as a fighter....Not impressed...............FES
 
The Randall #1 is certainly an iconic, traditional knife - first widely used in WW-II, still in production today, and has spawned many imitators as well. The one pictured is about ten years old. OH

P10100129.JPG
 
Surely the stockman by any brand is iconic, it was introduced at the turn of the century as an improvement in design over the standard cattle knife. It was designed to fit the exact needs of the working cowboy/ ranch or farm hand and remands an enormously popular pattern today! Which is a feat for any design let alone one with such specific design application, anyone agree?
 
Jack Black said:
Personally, I think actual knives are iconic, patterns, however good, are just patterns. You have to go back to the start. There was an original Barlow knife, and maybe there was with some of the other patterns too.
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This would be an interesting project. Might be best handled on a wiki though....

A 2 part question: A) what is the catalog of slip joint patterns and b) what maker introduced the pattern?

Wikipedia has this, but that's real lean.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocket_knife#Slip_joint_knife

I'm guessing that we don't really know who was first on most patterns. Perhaps best possible is to relax that and discuss most widespread or otherwise notable early versions. Witness the disputes about the first Bowie knife. And was there a definitive first Barlow?

As much as I love forums (been on usenet since 1990 or so), I tire of the amount of great knowledge that gets toss up on forums only to be timed out and left behind. Much more of a fan of stable, quasi-static content for things like that.
 
pinnah said:
And was there a definitive first Barlow?
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We know that the first long-bolstered Barlow knives were made by the Sheffield of Samuel Barlow. I've posted pictures of some very early examples in the Barlow thread, but I don't know what blade the first Barlow had, don't know if anyone does.
 
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