How far do we stray from our roots?

J

jackknife

Joined
Oct 2, 2004
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They say you can't run far from what you are, or who you are. That roots run deep, and they always go with you, where ever you end up.

I wonder how many of us still carry the pattern of knife we started out with, or after many years of straying from our roots, have we returned?

There are some patterns Of knives I never tried, and I was just sitting here thinking of it, looking at some nice pictures that a forum member posted of some very nice trappers. Trappers are nice knives, and I can see that they have alot going for them. But I never got one. When I think back on it, nobody in my family or circle of aquantances had one. Dad had his little peanut, grandad had a stockman, one uncle had a stockman and another a TL-29, while a third uncle was a scout knife/sak fan. Then there was Uncle Paul, with his battery of small two blade jacks that he had in every pocket, and a spare stashed in his tobacco pouch.

Dad gave me a scout knife when I was 12, and somehow that pattern has been a lifelong stable. I tried the one blade locking knives, but I never found need of the lock, and regretted not having a second, or even a thrid blade or tool. When I carried a soddie, I had a sak in a nylon belt sheath with a small flashight. While in the army, I had one of the issue stainless steel handle scout knives that Camillus must have made zillions of. In one form or another, I never escaped my scout knife roots, and even today, I keep a sak or scout knife around. Last summer I found an old Camillus scout knife at a yard sale, took it home and cleaned it up, and it's been a steady pocket companion since. Old carbon steel blade gets scary finger print skinning sharp. I guess since

How many of you are using a pattern of knife that you either came back to, or never went too far away from, since childhood. My whole life I've used just a scout, stockman, soddie, and peanut. The soddie is the only knife I had that nobody in my family had.

How many of you have strayed from your roots?
 
I have strayed a long way.
Almost non of the people I knew in shildhood carried a folder. They carried smaller sheatknifes, most typically a mora or a little nicer knife the same size. the diskussion among them was about if it was frost, eriksson Jönsson or someone else that did the sharpest 3 layer steel. They also debated if the 2 mm or the 2.5 mm thickness of steel was the best solution. But the slipjoints kind of slummerd inside me so when I got a little older I started to want them and its up to today what I carry EDC. First it was only onebladed EKAs but now my taste deweloped and I like the american traditionals as stockmen and trappers. Its a long way here so I use what I got.
The SAK was also an early knife I could by and i probobly by now has almost 10 of them but Its not a knife I easily gets hocked on. An traditional Scoutknifepattern would be it for me. I have a case Scout JR, a thad to small and stainless to fit my dreams but still a mighty fine knife.

Bosse
 
I carry a small reg Sebbie, and a SAK (after having sold or traded most of my folders), but still find myself thinking about the Schrade Cave Bear I had, a gift from a neighbor (I sold it like a fool on eBay). My father had the 34OT's younger and smaller brother, I am unsure of the exact model number. I'd like to get him one, and one for myself. He used that small stockman more than his Sharpfinger when camping, hunting and fishing.
 
Not to far from the beginning for me, carried a small buck stockman in the 60's, a kabar muskrat after that for like 11 years. Has always been the pointier clips for me, trappers
included, guess thats why I enjoy making them yet today. I can't ever remember being without a slipjoint on me.
Ken
 
When I was a kid I had a Scout knife. As I got older I gravitated toward SAKs, because I figured all useful knives had things like screwdrivers and bottle openers. I always found myself tinkering with stuff, and I certainly wasn't going to use a cutting blade as a screwdriver, for instance.

Appreciating all things that can hurt me, I gradually started collecting knives, and have all sorts of patterns now. I've gone through many phases as to what I carry in my pocket. I do a little less tinkering (most of my stuff runs right, these days... ;)) but still love my SAKs. OTOH, I've developed a real love of the slimline trapper pattern. But I have a Vic Soldier in my pocket today, and have for the last two weeks.

-- Sam
 
I'm carrying a Stockman pattern these days, since I inherited one from my grandfather.

But, the pattern I started with in '80/'81 was the SchradeUSA LB7. I had that or a Case two-blade Hunter for years. My dad had a S&W lockback, a nice one from the early 80's as well, and he bought me a Parker-Imai K139 for my birthday in '83. When I got out out of the navy, I bought a Kershaw Blackhorse. I always loved the lockback types, and they're the ones I have now (at least a dozen or more) in toolboxes, car trunk, bug-out bag, nightstand drawer, kitchen drawer, etc. I don't carry them as much these days, due to size and a limited need for such a large folder. That's where the Stockman fits in perfectly.

thx - cpr
 
My dad carried a small Uncle Henry stockman. He carried that same knife for years, it is one of my most treasured knives.My uncle carried a large Case single blade hunter. These were two knives that I saw used on a daily basis as I grew up. I guess thats why I carry a large single blade and a smaller stockman or similar knife in my EDC.
 
My first knife was a stockman and I have always had them and carried them. A stockman has always been a very useful pattern for me. Though it's probably no more (or less) useful than any other multi-blade pattern, maybe I just adapted to what I had and came to appreciate it. Either way, I have had a stockman for a very long time.

Mike
 
Is the root the knife we carry or the drive to carry the knife? We hang out here in a forum of other knife lovers... but we live in a world where the vast majority of people do not carry a knife of an kind, and even those of us that do are divided again between the multi tool users the tac guys, ad the trad guys.. so if you consider the fact that in a day where in certain areas knife users are viewed with scrutiny, and there is so much variation among style of knives, we have all technically kept true to our roots by staying with in the tradiitional realm. As far as patterns go..back in the day folks where limited as to what was in the rack at there hardware store..so you chose the closes the item that was closes to what you are comfortable with.. However now with internet access we have access literally to hundreds of patterns in thousands of variations. SO pattern selection now is dictated by specific need as well as stylistic choice.. That's just my opinion though ymv
 
My dad has worked in a kitchen for as long as I can remember. While he doesn't carry a pocket knife, he does appreciate a sharp knife. However, he also likes the Miracle Blade series.

I think I'll stick to my Opinel. Just picked up a #6, as well as a small Okapi. The Okapi doesn't want to take an edge for some odd reason, and even stranger was that the Opinel came sharp out of the box. Looks like it's time to break it in with some fruits.
 
YayILikePie, check your user cp. Left you a message.
 
I'm fond of stockmans. It wasn't the first style I carried. But it is the one I centered in on.
 
knarfeng said:
YayILikePie, check your user cp. Left you a message.
Click to expand...

User CP? Huh. Wow, I didn't even realize that that was there. Haha. Man, after so many posts, you'd think I would've realized that forums had such a function. I've been simply refreshing and searching around for lost threads that I have posted in. Looks like I have a lot to learn.
 
I actually started with a lockback. Old Schrade.
I then moved on to a stockman pretty quickly as the lockback just didn't do enough.
The stockman I have now is the large Schrade, yeller scales that I gave my grandfather years ago.
When he past away I was given the knife back. He used that knife quite a bit, has some great wear to it.
Sure, I collect various patterns that I like "looking" at, peanuts, toothpicks, but I've always used a stockman.
I miss that old man, he was my best friend the last 10yrs of his life. I think he knew that too.
Whenever I reach in my pocket for that yeller knife, I think about him.

mike
 
Well, my first knife was a cheap Boy Scout knife that I carried while camping through my childhood and teenage year. After trying out a couple different lockblades and SAKs, I was attracted to the traditional Trapper pattern. Sure it lacks the extra tools that the SAKs or even the old Scout knife has, but something about the way it fits my hand, and does anything I could ask of a folding knife, just keeps me coming back.

Over the years I have picked up a few other traditional patterns (peanut, congress, jack, etc.) and I like to use them, but still I keep coming back to the large Trapper pattern. I have not counted recently, but I think I have 6-8 Case large Trappers, and a couple more from other makers in my collection and most of them are "users".

Right now I'm alternating between a smooth bone SS Trapper with a Wharncliffe blade in place of the normal Spey blade, and a chestnut bone CV Trapper. If they would only make a chestnut CV with the Wharncliffe blade, I would be in Trapper heaven! :p
 
My first was an Imperial stockman my dad gave me before I was in grammar school. Second was a Cub Scout knife not sure about the age (5th or 6th grade I guess) and passed that on to my younger brother. Third was a Buck 110 my dad gave me right after they came out so I guess I was 10 or 11, still have and use the Buck and Imperial.

I enjoy a lot of styles of knives so I do not feel a division, but my interest still is with older styles. The makers and people with the same passion has kept me there.
 
My first knife at about the age 8 was well used Case Trapper, it was gave to me by my Grandpa. My Grandpa taught me how to squirrel hunt with him. My Dad taught me how to shoot a 22 after he came home after WW2. I carried the trapper for many years, I don't what happened to it, but I a think cousin took possession of it? I bought me another Case Trapper I still have it. When I started Iron working I carried a Case Congress, they were a good work knife.. These days I might carry any knife I have hundreds to choose from, but I still carry a Moore Maker Stag Trapper a lot of the time. If I had to choose one pattern it would be a serpentine whittler about 4" closed, so I guess I really like all knives. when I was a young kid I also had a Imperial Bowie thats what I called it, and I still like fixed blades to this day...

Thanks Jackknife for the question....
 
In a way far but not far.

As a child I didn't know one pattern from another in terms of name,nobody in my house was much interested in knives but my grandfather (who died well before I was born) had had several and these old relics and parts of them lurked around the house and cellar waiting to be reclaimed. Also digging in the garden unearthed rusted treasures beyond repair that my uncles and father had probably lost.

So, my knife consciousness was shaped by rather battered but once glorious knives in bone,stag and I remember one in tortoiseshell(maybe celluloid although it wasn't decaying or anything)and a battle scarred ivory character. I suppose these were mostly 2 blade Jacks, Pen-knives-equal end or bolsterless-and obese Scout or Army knives with odd tools or spikes...They were all English or German and from, for me at the time ,a far off bygone era when knives seemed important and of good quality.Black or pitilessly rusted and pitted blades were the norm,but I dreamed of what they must have been like gleaming new out of their box entrancing boys and men decades before. That's when I found I needed a knife to hand and the habit set.

This habit went through some dark and idiotic periods....knives seemed to become less appealing,more 'modern' or rather, more shoddy,I seemed unable to cultivate my habit properly and bought what was to be had. Much of it not that good but I assumed that was how things were. At the back of my mind an ancestral memory flickered of beautiful and admirable knives made by men using timeless materials for a generation or more of use,the magic words Sheffield and Solingen came in and out of this fantasy...

Years slipped by,the Internet appeared I discovered that in America traditional cutlers were still active and people still liked and used these old style pocket knives! El Knifedorado became a reality! What Sheffield had been making was an embarasment,things were better in Germany but it was the USA that appeared to answer my long unsatisfied needs.

Then came this forum, where friends can share and disagree on equal and kindly terms and my knowledge increased beyond measure. New inspiration to continue searching for more knives,different patterns ,to keep alive the dream of childhood of those near extinct and beautiful knives from the past. Only they are now brand new, something I seldom had before! To the right of my laptop, on my writing desk, there are about 25 of my knives close to hand,aesthetic objects but functional tools as well. These are nearly all new but are in Traditional forms or patterns,mostly American but knives too from Germany, Italy,France and China, a tribute to the information exchange on this forum.

So my tastes have been expanded and enhanced by this modern world, a paradox yes but a welcome one. It explains my liking for both carbon and stainless blades, carbon was to me as a child the steel but it was often in poor state due to time and neglect,my childish attempts to 'restore' the steel were usually futile and inept. Rust became an evil....stainless represents a knife in new and undamaged state,hence my liking for both steels when they are well wrought. But out there somewhere lies yet another unseen knife waiting to be rediscovered, a long lost pattern perhaps? Or a knife forgotten for decades in a drawer or down a sofa put into storage that was never recovered for some or other reason. That's the magic of knife collecting and recognition, it can never ever be finished, fortunately. I've come far to get not far.
 
My first knife of a good quality was a 2 bladed Old Timer 33OT Jackknife. I have carried many different styles since even Tactical. But it seems I have completed the circle back to the medium jack. In my pocket right now is a 70 or 80's two bladed jack made by Queen with Winterbottom Delrin scales. The medium jack just seems to fit me.
 
I was never serious about blades in scouts or growing up camping, they were just tools like screwdrivers. After I was in the service a brand new swanky tool came out and I bought one with my own money. Between that old original leatherman and the M697 linemen knife that was handed out like candy while I was in the service I probably lost 60 of those things, in the water, mud, or whatever.

I forget the reason but I found one on eBay awhile ago and bought it and mentioned it to my mother and she went upstairs and walked down with one of my old duty knives, it was like seeing an old friend.

I've become more drawn to one-handed knives over the years, but I still think about hard working slippies as the real deal.
 
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