Buck 501 age

[Daniel Moore]

Hey guys.

My grandfather gave me two knives a couple years ago.

The first was a Buck 110.

The second was a Buck Squire.

One scale is much darker than the other and the action is poor from him not maintaining it.

The tang is stamped in the center:

Buck
501
USA

On Buckknives.com, the tang is stamped

Buck
501U
USA

Does anyone know how old this might be?

Also, the B in "Buck" is a script font. The sheath is old looking and the belt loop is a thin riveted strip. There is no shielding from the inside button so all four bolster surfaces have circular impressions/scratches. The contemporary Squire sheath says "Buck Knives" whereas this says "BUCK" in a plain block font.

Any ideas?
Thanks.
Dan.

 

[Gossman Knives]

I don't claim to be an expert, but seems like your 501 is probably from the seventies. The U after the 501 is the way Buck dates their knives. according to Levines book Buck starting doing this I believe in 1987. As far as the sheath, the Buck stamp sounds typical of a seventies stamped sheath. I have an extensive collection of Bucks from that period. Hope this helps.