Heritage Whittler

R

rprocter

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recently i "won" a Schrade Heritage Whittler in red bone. the shield says 1983 and has "Everlasting Sharp" etch on main blade. pile side of tang:8041.
it is the only Schrade whittler i have seen in the last 6 months on ebay. am i correct in believing that Schrade did not make many whittler knives ?
i also have a Heritage/Schrade+/NY USA;7801 on pile side 4 in. Muskrat in brown bone with a very high gloss finish. it has no shield, date or blade etch.
did Schrade do a later run of Heritage without shield, date or etch ? thanks, roland
 
That 8041 Heritage you picked up was a dandy Roland. Very pretty knife.

A Schrade 804 shows up now and then, and a few 863's, but the whittler pattern didn't seem to be as common. Attached is a picture of those two whittlers, both acquired recently. The swell center 863 has the tang stamp ground off, as well as the pattern number off of the back. The 804 must be pre 60's. It has jigged bone handles and a sabre ground clip blade, like a KON-KAV stockman. The catalogs called the 804 a mechanics knife, and they came with a knife purse. Seems kind of sissy for a mechanic.:D

34659schrade_whittlers.JPG


One can only guess why when Schrade left off a shield, or why they left off the shield engraving or a blade etch. My guess is that they were very unpredictable with the production process, and it had a lot to do with being hand made. During the heyday, I think they made so many knives to keep up with demand, it seemed to be anything goes. Makes for fun collecting, and brings up a few head scratchers for us.
 
I believe there were green Heritage knives with 1983 shields, red Heritage with 1983 and 1984 shields, and brown Heritage with 1983, 1984, 1985 and 1986 shields.

If you have one without the shield or etch, it is likely a reject, second, or overstock. Still decent knives, but likely an unfinished knife that failed inspection for some reason, or was assembled during the "end of days" from leftover components. I notice that there have been several of these whittlers (#8041 was the 3 7/8" Three Bladed Whittler pattern) on eBay recently. It is like a dealer finally opened "that box" acquired from SMKW/BRK a couple of years ago.

Codger
 
Hal, hope i was not bidding against you on the whittler. i wanted it enough to purposely not check whom i was bidding against. you sure have a wide range of near mint Schrades. i'm never going to catch up ! below are pics of 7801. it is the very shiny finish on the handles that seems odd. i have no other smooth bone handled knife like this.
codger when you say acquired by SMKW/BRK, what is BRK and did these companies buy a lot of Schrade stock at closing ? i.e. then my 7801 is a "recent" knife, assembled from "older" parts. doesn't have the same appeal somehow, a bit like an imposter. do others feel like this ? roland
 
rprocter said:
Hal, hope i was not bidding against you on the whittler. i wanted it enough to purposely not check whom i was bidding against. you sure have a wide range of near mint Schrades. i'm never going to catch up ! below are pics of 7801. it is the very shiny finish on the handles that seems odd. i have no other smooth bone handled knife like this.
codger when you say acquired by SMKW/BRK, what is BRK and did these companies buy a lot of Schrade stock at closing ? i.e. then my 7801 is a "recent" knife, assembled from "older" parts. doesn't have the same appeal somehow, a bit like an imposter. do others feel like this ? roland
Click to expand...
Roland - glad you got it.

It's probably hard to tell what knives are "parts knives", but I'm sure there are several in my collection. There are a lot of new knives in unused condition for sale with some unfinished variations. In many cases, we can only guess at the real story.

I've always bet there were a lot of unpackaged knives that came out in pockets and lunch pails through the years, and some behind of the scenes smuggling operations.
 
Smoky Mountain knife Works and Blue Ridge Knives bought the WIP... finished knives of every ilk from the factory auction (see the Presidents Pipes & Martin signed certificates of awfulticity). Included were knives from production overruns, both entirely finished, and sometimes all finished but shielding and etching. As an operating business, once assured that their production and warranty obligations for a knife were satisfied, they would turn the overruns into SFO's for customers by etching, engraving, and/or shielding. As I said, the knives from the WIP were everything in the plant not nailed down, and even those if they could be pried up. ISC workers, the few retained from the mass layoff in July thru the October auction, were under orders to assemble all of the parts in house which could be assembled. Thus a bunch of oddities never seen before. I have quite a few oddities and I like them. I even have some knives from the trash bins which were warranty returns. And some unfinished parts. All fit a niche in the history of ISC.

Michael
 
Codger, thank you for your explanation. i think i have a number of these variant knives. they all look soooo new. too new. they don't speak to me the way a "regular" Schrade does, which i picture as being made by happy employees as part of a regular run. perhaps it's the absence of a proper place in the history and development of Schrade knives. roland
 
well my HERITAGE/SCHRADE+/N.Y. USA;8041 1983 whittler has arrived. a v. beautiful knife in all aspects and solid with some heft to it. it definitely stands out from my other Schrades and rivals my Schrade IXL Wostenholm ship srimshaw 4" LB. could it be that this whittler is one of the finest knives Schrade made, or are there other Schrades out there just as special ? roland
 
The red bone on that one of yours looks awful nice Roland. Plus, the 804 pattern iself is one of Schrades best slip joint patterns, if I'm voting. My two Heritage stockman, 83 and 85 stockman, knives both stand out nicely. For me it is the smooth bone handles, grooved bolsters, plus the blade etch.
 
Very nice knife there Roland, I grabbed a Heritage Whittler from e-bay a short while ago, that one has brown bone handles, looks like Michael was right someone must of opened up a stored lot, due to the quantity that appeared very close to one another.

Rusty1
 
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