- Joined
- Nov 12, 2011
- Messages
- 658
a few weeks ago I posted a thread asking about the difference between today's best production slipjoints and the earlier classics. Did the great older brands - Robeson, Hen and Rooster, et al., have a certain 'je ne sais quoi', that the new ones didn't, especially in respect of their walk and talk. Carl - Jackknife - argued the affirmative, and to justify his case showed a lovely old Bertram half-stockman that he owned. It opened as smoothly as if it was on ball-bearings apparently, I thought I would love to know what that was really like. One of these Hen and Roosters was a grail knife for me. I gues I'd get one eventually and know what it was like, after saving up a lot of money, and guiltily bidding too much on the big auction site.
...anyway, anyone who has spent a lot of time on this forum, and seen the generosity of its members, will know what happened next...a package arrived in my mail box a couple of days ago, I opened it, it was filled with newspaper, and the very same half-stockman tumbled out. Carl goes out of his way to prove a point, the knife was everything he said it was: the main blade opens with the perfect amount of tension, feels completely light but firm, the stag is beautifully burnished. The serpentine frame and long blade is incredibly sleek, and the blades ground very thin.
I'm really grateful for this gift, and I'll be sure to pay it forward when I get an opportunity to make another forum member happy with something out of my collection, and of course there is some payback as well. Here are some photos:
The knife, as a classic american half stockman pattern, has an american soul, however it was made in Germany, so I thought it proper to reintroduce the knife to its german roots: the scene was a beergarden on the Rhein stretch of Lake Konstanz:
this should be german enough:
perfect proportions in the blade and body:
stag mark side
nested blades
...anyway, anyone who has spent a lot of time on this forum, and seen the generosity of its members, will know what happened next...a package arrived in my mail box a couple of days ago, I opened it, it was filled with newspaper, and the very same half-stockman tumbled out. Carl goes out of his way to prove a point, the knife was everything he said it was: the main blade opens with the perfect amount of tension, feels completely light but firm, the stag is beautifully burnished. The serpentine frame and long blade is incredibly sleek, and the blades ground very thin.
I'm really grateful for this gift, and I'll be sure to pay it forward when I get an opportunity to make another forum member happy with something out of my collection, and of course there is some payback as well. Here are some photos:
The knife, as a classic american half stockman pattern, has an american soul, however it was made in Germany, so I thought it proper to reintroduce the knife to its german roots: the scene was a beergarden on the Rhein stretch of Lake Konstanz:
this should be german enough:
perfect proportions in the blade and body:
stag mark side
nested blades
