And with a single brush stroke, Jack nails it perfectly. :thumbup:
In our grandpa's time, these knives were used as pocket pocket knives. Cutting open a burlap grain sack of feed, cutting a piece of rope, cutting a 'chaw' off a thick plug of Kentucky twist, cutting a nice firm piece of chicken liver to go on a hook while cat fish hunting, cutting..., well you get the idea, it was a cutting tool. It was carried around in a pocket a lot, and used now and then for things that needed to be separated but was too strong to be ripped or torn apart. It was a dedicated cutting tool that was carried a lot, but used now and then. This is why handles were smooth curves that didn't wear holes on pockets of work overalls, or uniforms. These men took very great care of their tools, no matter if it was a set of wrenches, a hammer, screw driver, or wood plane. They didn't use a wrench as a hammer, nor a screw driver as a pry bar if there was a real pry bar in the tool chest. Oh yes, there were some of what the young guys call a 'hard use' knife around. Lots of servicemen came home with a Camillus TL-29 in a pocket, or an issue MKL, or what was called a demo knife. In the 50's and 60's I saw a lot of well worn old TL-29's that were still in use by the soldier who 'liberated' it from the army. My Uncle Charlie used his for decades, after he came home from a long walk from a beach in France to Germany. He only retired it when I came home on leave with a new 'libertated' Camillus TL-29 from our supply room. He was a bit disdainful of the new one's plastic handle though.
When grandpa went hunting, he took his 'hunting knife'. Sometimes it may have been a Case little finn with the stacked leather washer handle like I saw a great deal of growing up, or maybe one of those German stag handled Edge Pro's that were popular in the 50's. The hunting knife was made for the 'huntin' so it was used for such. Right tool for the job kind of thing. That was a popular mindset in those days, the right tool for the job. If you had something to do, and the pocket knife was small for the job, then you used a bigger took. A sheath knife, a machete, hatchet, was used.
My own dad was a perfect example of this. Before he left for school a few years before WW2, being the very first one in his family to do so, his mother gave him a nice little pocket knife that was more appropriate in her mind for a suit wearing academic of that era. The gift meant a lot to him because of the sentiment, so he used the knife gently as a cutting tool only. That knife went everywhere with him for the next 40 years, and he only retired it not long before his death from leukemia in 1981. It was a cutting tool. I grew up seeing him use that knife for all his cutting jobs that a pocket knife can be asked to do. But if it got too heavy duty, he had a cut down English machete he kept in his car that he called his bushwhacker. That was his 'heavy duty' knife. It had a 9 inch sheepfoot blade and a canvas sheath, and was the beater knife. Around the house he had a beat up Stanley utility knife for things he knew would mess up his mothers Case Peanut.
The old pocket knives that grandpa used ere marketed as fine cutting tools. They were not marketed as end of the world disaster tools, combat knives, survival knives, automobile crash rescue tools, or any other tool that could used for things an over active imagination could dream up. They were carried by delivery truck drivers, farm hands, tradesmen, warehouse clerks, paperboys, church deacons, and everyone who had a pair of pants on. And in those day, if a man had his pants on, you could make a good bet that a pocket knife was in there someplace. Probably the most common of all pocket knives I saw growing up, was the typical serpentine jack about 3 1/4 inches closed, with two blades. Somehow, with that kind of life, most men in the years before and after WW2 managed to live a good life, survive a war, and raise a family in the knew phenomenon of the American suburban landscape.
A good pocket knife will last you most of the rest of your life if treated like a knife.
Carl.
At least I've not forgotten my name yet! 
