An observation in the National Parks

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Hi, everyone. I just returned from a wonderful visit to Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks If you have not been, I'd heartily recommend it. There was beautiful scenery, fantastic geothermal features, and abundant wildlife. The highlight for me was observing wolves battling grizzly bears over a bison carcass.

I packed my trusty SAK classic and tinker, Fiskars hatchet and folding saw. The Tinker did food prep, cut rope, and whittled sticks for S'mores. The hatchet made kindling and split wood. We were gifted firewood, so the folding saw saw no action.

Now for the title of my post... the cutlery being sold in gift shops was atrocious. There were dirt cheap Chinese SAK clones with first names burned into the wood scales, one hand openers with serrated blades and anodized scales, and little leatherman-like tools. It's too bad kids of today are being raised on this stuff. I'd swear if this was 20 years ago, the stores would have sold SAKs, Bucks and Schrades. Am I being overly nostalgic, or did they hock cheap crap back then, too?
 
They've always peddled cheap crap to tourists, at least as far back as the 60's. I have no first-hand experience before that.
 
You'll occasionally find high quality items but with the price tag to match. I've gotten Zippos at Cape Canaveral and at the USS Constitution, though not so sure you'd find pocket knives at those locations.
I have the same gripe with the BSA, both in Council stores and at summer camps nationwide, most of the pocket knives are pure junk. Occasionally there will be a Bear and Sons and most shops stock BSA branded SAK's, but the rest is blah.

I took a couple of my Scouts to task this past week for buying junk lockbacks rather than SAK's. In those particular cases the parents were more or less to blame as they left the boys under the impression that non-locking knives should be avoided. They sure as heck didn't hear that from their Scoutmasters and counselors! And it wasn't for their lack of cash either, it never ceases to amaze me how much candy an average 13 y/o can consume...
 
I remember bringing home a rubber "Indian" hatchet from Niagara Falls, must have been the early '60's. So yeah, pretty much always junk. Snow globes, pendants, other tourist rubbish. Good is hard to come by, in any generation.
 
I spent several years living near a National Park on the East coast and locals referred to the gift shop in the park as "ground zero" for tourism. Tourists will buy ANYTHING. What's sold/bought at a gift shop is no indication of what is normal anywhere else.
 
In the past of the knives were cheap ones they were still American made. Look on the bay and see all the old advert knives.
 
You gotta know where to look for the good stuff. In OC MD, there is a print shop that sells misprints t shirts. I've found junk knives on the boardwalk, but squirreled away in hardware stores, old Schrades and Bucks.
 
Yeah, check out the hardware, sporting goods and camping stores. They've always had the good stuff. I grew up in a tourist town (Eureka Springs, Arkansas), and almost every store had cheap junk, including knives. I bought my first "Rambo Survival Knife" for $12, in one of those places. You know, the one with the hollow plastic handle with a bundle of "survival" gear, and a compass in the butt.:D

There was one store that had quality, and you could tell the second you walked in the door. I just went back to visit for my 20th high-school reunion, and one of the only stores that hadn't changed hands or closed was Nelson's Leather. They've still got great knives and everything else in the store is top notch quality. I still wear a pair of gloves I bought there 23 years ago.
 
I too bought tourist trash when I was a kid. But I also have an inexpensive Japanese fixed blade my parents bought me at some kitschy tourist shop in Cherokee, North Carolina on one of our first vacations in the Smoky Mountains (probably around 1970). Indian head on top of the bone handle and all, but it has lasted all these years, and would serve admirably if I needed it to (the thin suede leather sheath came unstitched near the blade tip not long after I got it).

The tang stamp on the carbon steel blade is:

G.C.CO
JAPAN
371

Daniel Dorn said:
There was one store that had quality, and you could tell the second you walked in the door. I just went back to visit for my 20th high-school reunion, and one of the only stores that hadn't changed hands or closed was Nelson's Leather. They've still got great knives and everything else in the store is top notch quality. I still wear a pair of gloves I bought there 23 years ago.
Click to expand...

Good to hear.

James Hardware is still operating in the small Indiana town where I grew up. I moved south 31 years ago, and when I was back visiting family in May of this year the store looked almost exactly as it did when I was a small boy. Picked up a few plumbing supplies to repair a toilet at my parents' house, and nearly walked out with a new Case stockman.

When we all go back for Thanksgiving I will take my 20 year old son to James Hardware to see if he wants to buy another Case to go with his yeller peanut from the same store where his dad bought his first pocket knife over 40 years ago.
 
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