Drop point blade history?

The folding aspect is interesting, your picture of the Remington is likely the oldest? However, I suspect that c19th Clasp Knives may have had drop-point type Skinner blades.

Levine (1985: 220-221) has a chapter on Office & Letter-Opener Knives where he states 'An "office knife" is a relatively large equal-end pen knife that has a spear master blade for opening letters and a spey type blade to serve as an ink eraser'
These were c19th and early c20th knives. Samples shown include Remington, Ulster, Winchester and the American Shear & Knife Co. which certainly has a 'Spey' that looks like a Drop-Point.

In more recent times the Copperhead pattern often has a Clip and Drop-Point and the Sodbuster introduced by CASE in the 60s sports a similar blade- this is of course a copy of German wooden handled work-knives from the c19th with the same type of blade.

Seems to me the blade in some form existed long before the name was coined and really took off due to innovations in the fixed blade world as mentioned.

1743158991045.jpeg
 
Will Power said:
The folding aspect is interesting, your picture of the Remington is likely the oldest? However, I suspect that c19th Clasp Knives may have had drop-point type Skinner blades.

Levine (1985: 220-221) has a chapter on Office & Letter-Opener Knives where he states 'An "office knife" is a relatively large equal-end pen knife that has a spear master blade for opening letters and a spey type blade to serve as an ink eraser'
These were c19th and early c20th knives. Samples shown include Remington, Ulster, Winchester and the American Shear & Knife Co. which certainly has a 'Spey' that looks like a Drop-Point.

In more recent times the Copperhead pattern often has a Clip and Drop-Point and the Sodbuster introduced by CASE in the 60s sports a similar blade- this is of course a copy of German wooden handled work-knives from the c19th with the same type of blade.

Seems to me the blade in some form existed long before the name was coined and really took off due to innovations in the fixed blade world as mentioned.

View attachment 2832205
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Thank you, I'll try to look on the internet and find a catalog of these brands
 
For what it's worth, putting aside the spey blade, the other looks like a modification of a sodbuster blade on the Remington 1123. Sodbuster is a modern term, the pattern is originally thought to come from Germany, and is usually cataloged as a "folding butcher knife" or "folding slaughtering knife". The German connection also makes since as Remington was mainly staffed by German cutlers early on. Boker enticed German cutlers to immigrate to America to staff its northeast operations, Remington would later entice many to leave Boker for Remington's start up :).

You'll have to use a translator (Google's works well), but here's a great German thread on them and their butcher knife origins -

https://messerforum.net/threads/kla...chtmesser-hippekniep-sodbuster-mineur.146896/ .
 
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iamfine10 said:
Thank you, I'll try to look on the internet and find a catalog of these brands
Click to expand...

Will Power said:
The folding aspect is interesting, your picture of the Remington is likely the oldest? However, I suspect that c19th Clasp Knives may have had drop-point type Skinner blades.

Levine (1985: 220-221) has a chapter on Office & Letter-Opener Knives where he states 'An "office knife" is a relatively large equal-end pen knife that has a spear master blade for opening letters and a spey type blade to serve as an ink eraser'
These were c19th and early c20th knives. Samples shown include Remington, Ulster, Winchester and the American Shear & Knife Co. which certainly has a 'Spey' that looks like a Drop-Point.

In more recent times the Copperhead pattern often has a Clip and Drop-Point and the Sodbuster introduced by CASE in the 60s sports a similar blade- this is of course a copy of German wooden handled work-knives from the c19th with the same type of blade.

Seems to me the blade in some form existed long before the name was coined and really took off due to innovations in the fixed blade world as mentioned.
Click to expand...
hab4SdY.jpg

This is probably what you were talking about. This one seems like something between a spear and a drop to me.
 
oldmanwilly said:
I'm not trying to be cute or funny, but these are all examples of corner tang flint knives from North America from who-knows-when:

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I know they're sharpened on all sides, but they sure look like drop points to me. I think this sums up my thoughts on the subject:



Bob Loveless may deserve credit for popularizing the pattern, and various makers/manufacturers before him surely made plenty, but I doubt we'll ever know the true "first drop point."
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Thank you for these, I was feeling like a bad archaeologist because I couldn't remember where to look for stone drop points. I know the oldest known clip point knives are ancient Macedonian/Greek flaked stone blades. And the oldest blades that could truly be called spear point knives (as opposed to hand axes) predate modern humans and were made by Neanderthals. But I couldn't remember where I had seen stone drop points. Thanks again for bringing them up.
 
iamfine10 said:
BookReaderImages.php

E.C. Simmons Keen Kutter : Catalogue, 1912,
bottom left, what do you think guys?
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Honestly, I would consider both of the "spey blades" on this page drop points myself. Maybe folks just used to call those not-quite-spear-but-more-pointy-than-you-actually-want-to-castrate-a-steer blades spey blades because that was the closest common term before Loveless.
 
I grew up in the 1950s and "60s. When I was a boy Scout, I do not remember seeing a fixed blade knife with anything but a clippe3d or Bowe style profile.

Then, in the early 1970s the custom knife ting began to gain momentum, with the Blade Show and the rise of
+forged knives. And that is when I saw the first drop point blades . . .and they were from Bob Loveless.

That is the way I remember it.
 
Wowbagger said:
Is that the new Cold Steel Cutsall ?
Nice toothy edge(s) !
Good for batoning ?
I bet it is one of those new snobby blade materials that are hard to sharpen .

(😂)
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Word is, they are using this new flint knapping technology, but I don't know, ain't nobody got time for that
 
ShaiHulud said:
Word is, they are using this new flint knapping technology, but I don't know, ain't nobody got time for that
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Yeah . . .I saw his guy pick up a good sized rock and he just whacked off ten or fifteen smaller chunks and worked each of them into a little point. Made a mss outa what could have been a decent hand chopper.

All those little points . . .then he tied them onto these little dticks like they were a kids spear.

I mean, nothing is the same ever since it got warm.

 
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Will Power said:
Frank is near right, it's the 3rd edn. 1985 (my original quote post 21) But Levine is obviously using scans of catalogues at times so I'll say it's the time frame he refers to late c19th early c20th.
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So this might be the oldest drop point blade on a folding knife I've seen.
 
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