Do you remember your grandad's knife........

[LabRat]

Okay everyone, let's get out the kleenex and take a trip down memory lane!

My grandfather was a cattle rancher and he carried this Uncle Henry stockman every since I can remember. When he got too old to safely handle a knife I inherited it. It's one that I will never sell or give away.

There's not much left to the clip blade but it still "walks and talks" like new. I still carry it every now and then.

It is a "pocketworn" knife created the hard way. I'm thinking about going down to Wal-Mart and starting to work on my own pocketworn knife. I don't care what that other knife company says. You just can't buy that kind of character off of the shelf. It has to be earned!

Does anyone have memories of your father or grandfather's knife? Maybe even your grandmother's?

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WARNING: Use of this product may be hazardous to your health. It has been determined to cause cause cancer in laboratory animals!

 

[stray]

I had 2 of my Grandads but 1 was lost off the Gandy bridge in Tampa around 1972. It was a pearl handled beauty that I lent to a kid to clear up a reel snarl. Didn't know him and I about cried when he dropped it between the cracks. I did my best to not make him feel bad about it. But I still do and it taught me a valuable lesson.
"Got a knife?"
"No."

I still have his boyscout knife that I think was issued to him during WWI when he fought for our country.

jeff

 

[JW]

I recently got my grandpa's knife back from Marble's where they refinished the blade and tightened the three piece stag handle. It's a circa 1900 'Ideal' model 7" fixed blade. It doesn't go hunting anymore but it could still do the job if I wanted to take the chance. It rides in the original sheath with his name burned into the leather. It dressed the last deer in the late 60's.(sniff)
Grandpa hunted with us until he was 75 years old (mainly posted on pheasant drives then) and was still a good shot.
It's in my fireproof safe most of the time, but it gets taken out frequently for admiration, fondling and a rub of Ren.wax.
(sniff) Knife like this has 'soul'

 

[mdavis]

my grandfather has given me several
knives over the years.
knives as simple as a craftsman,
and a complex as a rehandled english
rigging knife. and my gramps was never a
sailor.
no mater how tactical knives need to be,
there are some that endure time.
-matt

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-matt

"you see that mountain over there? near as i can figure, that's where we are!"

 

[rfrost]

My Grandpa always carried a 6" Randall Model 1, bought from Bo back in the late '40s-early '50s. He had seen some guys in his platoon with them in the war, and when he came back, he had to buy a Randall! It has a stag handle and carbon steel blade etched with his name: Randall Frost. I remember the pride he felt when he first showed it to me way back when...

He also carried a little Gerber Bird & Trout, bought for him by my uncle, and an old, brand-unknown, multi-blade folder. But that Randall #1 still makes me salivate when I think of it!

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"Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me!"
RFrost5746@aol.com or Robert_Frost@ars.aon.com




[This message has been edited by rfrost (edited 24 October 1999).]

 

[knzn]

I have my grandpa's old "Keencutter" in a shadow box in our room.

 

[Phillip Jones]

Remember it? I've still got it and will never let it go.
About the time that my twin brother Barry and I were born our grandfather made a large bowie with cow legbone for the handle. I wish I had a picture to show but I don't.

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If a man can keep alert and imaginative, an error is a possibility, a chance at something new; to him, wandering and wondering are a part of the same process. He is most mistaken, most in error, whenever he quits exploring.

William Least Heat Moon

 

[Kingknives]

I have my Grandfathers knife, through my Dad. It's not really that old, but it's the last knife he owned before he passed away. It's an 8 dot Case Stockman Tactical Knife (LOL, just kidding about the tactical part)

He was an auto mechanic, worked hard his whole life, and his knives saw quite a bit of use. I sure do miss him.

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"May you live in interesting times"

AKTI - A000389

 

[silverwing]

LabRat: thanks for remembering that some folks' grandmothers had knives too!

i'd give anything to have that knife my grandma had. this was no ordinary kitchen knife, it was her working knife for her crafts and her trade. it was a fixed blade, mebbe 5-6 inches of steel, and what i remember most clearly was the shine she kept on that blade--every night, one of the last chores she did was to clean it and polish it, and then wrap it carefully in a cloth and put it away. i was not allowed to handle it because it was *her* knife, one of the special knives which were sacred to each individual until after their death.

i don't know if my memory is accurate or not, but i remember her using something to clean it with, like a block of something--she'd stroke it across the blade a few times, then polish it with her special knife cloth. anyone have any clues what that might have been that she was using? it didn't sound like a sharpening stone, but i guess it could have been. it seemed more like something softer than stone-- wood? hard soap? other??

i think the handle was some kind of horn or antler material--white, shiny, but with ridges the length of it. it had a bit of a guard on it, not much. not much belly to the blade, and i remember a mark of some kind on the blade but i don't remember what it was.

i was six when last i saw it, after all

i envy you folks who have heirlooms from your family's past. you're blessed! my only heirlooms are my memories

silverwing