I'm pretty sure that celluloid was invented as a product to win the million dollar billiard ball contest. A businessman was trying to come up with a simulated elephant ivory, figuring a lot of money could be made selling pool tables if each billiard ball didn't have to be carved out of a single sound piece of elephant tusk ivory. Then a man wouldn't have to be rich to buy one, and people could play on tables rented for public use.
But celluloid can blow up on impact, and soon may emit explosive fumes, so while test balls were made they didn't pass final testing, because sometimes they exploded. It still had a lot of uses, memorable are the old celluloid movies that we saw and drawing plates used to hold hand drawn images for animation "cell's".
Remington invented their own brand of celluloid, which they named PyRemite, and used it on their knifes. They couldn't leave out the Rem in PyRemite, which stands for Remington. One of their brilliant additions when altering celluloid was gunpowder, maybe because they had it lying around, but someone at Remington must have known that PyRemite would be even more explosive than celluloid.
Good celluloid can be hard to detect from the original items sometimes. I bought a very old knife from a popular dealer and we both had assumed that the ivory in this one was a celluloid. About two years later I assembled all of my celluloid ivory pieces. I noticed that the ivory grain pattern in the celluloids was on the surface only, and would wear off in spots. I took a good look at one of them and noticed that the grain patterns remained in the material wherever it was cut or sanded, and even though it was at least 100 years old and it had not shrunk a bit. Turned out to be real ivory, fooled the seller, the knife dealer and myself, but at least we all got stuck with real ivory.
Antique dealers use a heated needle for celluloid testing, as horns and such don't melt the same way as celluloid does, which melts like a plastic.. People heat a tiny needle red hot and stick it in a hard to notice place in celluloid, watching for the smooth quick melt and trying to get a whiff of the odor released, which smells plastic like when melting. Celluloid can explode from being too near a flame, as it may release hazardous gas fumes, so it's best not to heat the needle with a flame close to it. When celluloid gasses it can damage other celluloids it comes into contact with, and cause metal corrosion too. Bakelite smells different, and doesn't need the needle test, but it does smell awful for just a moment or two when first removed from a dunk and short soak in really hot water.
The formula which is used for the celluliod is basically the same today as it was 100 years ago. There may be a little difference in the formulation, but it is still a nitrate product.
*Nitrate does shrink to a degree over a lenght of time. The chances of this happening is greater on knives that are not pinned and cut properly. (No need to worry about the Case Select product not being cut and pinned properly.)
* THE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO REMEMBER ABOUT CELLULOID HANDLED KNIVES IS TO STORE THEM IN A COOL AND DRY PLACE. HEAT IS VERY DAMAGING TO THE MATERIAL! (DO NOT LET THE SUN SHINE INTO A CASE ONTO CELLULOID HANDLED KNIVES! YOU ARE ASKING FOR PROBLEMS!)
One pointer our vendor shared with us is, "Handle your celluloid knives often. The more you handle and feel them, the shiny they get. The oil in your hands get into the Celluloid, making it shiny. It's beautiful!"
Because of the possiblity of Celluloid shrinking or cracking, Case is putting a disclaimer in every box to notify our consumer of this possiblity. Also, it will tell the consumer to not store these knives with other knives because of the possiblity of decomposition of the material.
)...but it was an awesome sight...
