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- Aug 17, 2013
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Last Friday my girl friend and I happened to be driving back from Chicago to NYC and upon a great amount of supplication on my part she agreed to take an afternoon off from driving (and off I-80) to visit Titusville and see the Great Eastern Cutlery Factory, that OZ of the knife knut's imagination. It was a really lovely afternoon spent talking and geeking out over pocket knives (I hope I haven't radically altered her conception of me LOL). Well without further ado let get to the visit. DISCLAIMER: In my excitement and distraction I sadly did not take as many pics as I would have liked to. Also certain trade secrets prohibit certain areas of the factory from being photographed. BUt more important that nice photos of nice knives were the stories of Nice folks, and GEC sure has a wealth of them.
Upon pulling up to the former Cyclops Steel Works you're met with a somewhat unassuming building in a resuscitated industrial park.
As soon as I walked through the doors though I ran smack into MR Bill Howard, President and designer of all of GEC's fine cutlery. I immediately went to shake his hand and introduce myself. He seemed a bit taken a back at first, I probably interrupted some sort of important knife business, and true to the humble integrity of GEC he didn't even introduce himself as President. IT was about lunch time and most of the staff were on break so he stopped what he was doing and took me into the Factory store as we talked.
(Censored for family friendly eyes)
I probably coon fingered about a couple dozen knives. It was just so great to see them all laid out before me. And Bill didn't seem to mind a bit. He bemoaned their relatively low stock of retail knives, saying that the current demand for GEC from distributors pretty much drained them of anything for their factory sales. I guess that's a pretty situation to be in. LOL.
As most of the workers were still out to lunch Bill gave me a quick overview of the factory floors as we talked about the amazing collection of knives in their display cases. I proudly showed him my most carried knife. My smooth white bone toothpick, Precious:
He genuinely seemed proud to see one of his early creations so well used and loved. After some subtle suggestion on my part, I'm hoping we may see a new run of 12's down the pike. LOL Actually I joked with him about how many "suggestions" he must get from backseat drivers like us. You could tell that he greatly values his fans, while being a bit taken aback, embarrassed by the enthusiasm for his work. He told me that he started the cutlery to fulfill his own passions and, as I've always suspected, tries to make sure to balance sustainability/profitability with fun and innovation. He joked about a bunch of patterns/scale materials that he knew wouldn't sell well, but he just wanted to make. How about that?! Passion and integrity taking precedence over shrewd business sense. To be fair GEC has both, but I think that integrity is really what draws us and its very refreshing to see it rewarded.
As we looked down on the floor I asked where all the machines came from. Bill perked up and could tell the origin and details about every single piece of machinery on the floor. THIs one came from Marbles, that one from Schrade, that one from Buck (when they were outside of San Diego, he became visibly dismayed with Buck's move, layoff of workers, and current production), this one here from Camillus, and on and on. These knives we love so much are not only in the tradition of the old knives they're literally made on the same machines, living breathing history.
At this point the Great Christine Tucker started us on our tour and Bill lurked off to source some cocobolo or some other such knifely task. Chris just has a great sense of humor, I guess you have to when dealing with a bunch of Knuts like us, and everyone there just seemed a tiny bit bemused by the success and enthusiasm for their products. Managing all of the SFO's on top of their own productions sounds like quite a monumental task. I wont divulge details, but at least as far Chris says, we have a long run of very interesting knives ahead for us.
Perhaps Chris was being a bit too "chatty"
because before long Bill's son, William, grabbed us away from her and gave us the full tour. He went through just about every single step (at least 200 of them) in the production of their knives. IT was really quite amazing and I wont try to cover it all, but the thing that stuck out most for me was that an operation like GEC is really somewhere between and artisanal and industrial production. It was fascinating to learn that they have their own tool and die engineer on staff capable of "programming" these antique machines to do just about anything they want. GEC also maintains many production steps that have long been lost to the world of cutlery. One such step is annealing (softening by heating to red hot) the tangs of the blades so that they don't break off with use but also to allow for minute crinking in the assembly process to make sure that all blades are centered and not rubbing liners or other blades. Also the attention and intricacy put into their blade grinding seems second to no other cutlery and is exemplified by their amazing whittler and stockmen. As William put it 99 percent of blade centering and fitting is in the grind.
Well by the time the tour was wrapped up the workers were getting ready to head home and William let me have one last look at the knives they had in store. After such a very generous amount of time spent showin gme around I felt it was incumbent upon me to buy a knife (that was one way to justify it to my GF LOL). After another long round of CF and CEing I knew which one it was gonna be.
I picked out a cheery Osage Orange 73:
It went straight in the pocket to be used as Bill intended it to be.
Upon pulling up to the former Cyclops Steel Works you're met with a somewhat unassuming building in a resuscitated industrial park.
As soon as I walked through the doors though I ran smack into MR Bill Howard, President and designer of all of GEC's fine cutlery. I immediately went to shake his hand and introduce myself. He seemed a bit taken a back at first, I probably interrupted some sort of important knife business, and true to the humble integrity of GEC he didn't even introduce himself as President. IT was about lunch time and most of the staff were on break so he stopped what he was doing and took me into the Factory store as we talked.
(Censored for family friendly eyes)
I probably coon fingered about a couple dozen knives. It was just so great to see them all laid out before me. And Bill didn't seem to mind a bit. He bemoaned their relatively low stock of retail knives, saying that the current demand for GEC from distributors pretty much drained them of anything for their factory sales. I guess that's a pretty situation to be in. LOL.
As most of the workers were still out to lunch Bill gave me a quick overview of the factory floors as we talked about the amazing collection of knives in their display cases. I proudly showed him my most carried knife. My smooth white bone toothpick, Precious:
He genuinely seemed proud to see one of his early creations so well used and loved. After some subtle suggestion on my part, I'm hoping we may see a new run of 12's down the pike. LOL Actually I joked with him about how many "suggestions" he must get from backseat drivers like us. You could tell that he greatly values his fans, while being a bit taken aback, embarrassed by the enthusiasm for his work. He told me that he started the cutlery to fulfill his own passions and, as I've always suspected, tries to make sure to balance sustainability/profitability with fun and innovation. He joked about a bunch of patterns/scale materials that he knew wouldn't sell well, but he just wanted to make. How about that?! Passion and integrity taking precedence over shrewd business sense. To be fair GEC has both, but I think that integrity is really what draws us and its very refreshing to see it rewarded.
As we looked down on the floor I asked where all the machines came from. Bill perked up and could tell the origin and details about every single piece of machinery on the floor. THIs one came from Marbles, that one from Schrade, that one from Buck (when they were outside of San Diego, he became visibly dismayed with Buck's move, layoff of workers, and current production), this one here from Camillus, and on and on. These knives we love so much are not only in the tradition of the old knives they're literally made on the same machines, living breathing history.
At this point the Great Christine Tucker started us on our tour and Bill lurked off to source some cocobolo or some other such knifely task. Chris just has a great sense of humor, I guess you have to when dealing with a bunch of Knuts like us, and everyone there just seemed a tiny bit bemused by the success and enthusiasm for their products. Managing all of the SFO's on top of their own productions sounds like quite a monumental task. I wont divulge details, but at least as far Chris says, we have a long run of very interesting knives ahead for us.
Perhaps Chris was being a bit too "chatty"
because before long Bill's son, William, grabbed us away from her and gave us the full tour. He went through just about every single step (at least 200 of them) in the production of their knives. IT was really quite amazing and I wont try to cover it all, but the thing that stuck out most for me was that an operation like GEC is really somewhere between and artisanal and industrial production. It was fascinating to learn that they have their own tool and die engineer on staff capable of "programming" these antique machines to do just about anything they want. GEC also maintains many production steps that have long been lost to the world of cutlery. One such step is annealing (softening by heating to red hot) the tangs of the blades so that they don't break off with use but also to allow for minute crinking in the assembly process to make sure that all blades are centered and not rubbing liners or other blades. Also the attention and intricacy put into their blade grinding seems second to no other cutlery and is exemplified by their amazing whittler and stockmen. As William put it 99 percent of blade centering and fitting is in the grind.
Well by the time the tour was wrapped up the workers were getting ready to head home and William let me have one last look at the knives they had in store. After such a very generous amount of time spent showin gme around I felt it was incumbent upon me to buy a knife (that was one way to justify it to my GF LOL). After another long round of CF and CEing I knew which one it was gonna be.
I picked out a cheery Osage Orange 73:
It went straight in the pocket to be used as Bill intended it to be.
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