I wonder how sharp knives on the prairie were kept?

[silenthunterstudios]

This blog has some great photos of knife grinders from around the world. This photo is from the end of the time known as the Old West but from Baltimore, not the West.

https://remouleurs.wordpress.com/

That's a good point. I'm glad you said it and I didn't though. BRL says buy the knife, not the story. But a lot of folks enjoy the stories. Fantasy is often more pleasant than history. But sometimes history is just as extraordinary.

I wouldn't mind meeting her...

 

[mnblade]

Mr. Powell notice me eating watermelon with my Puma and asked if it needed touching up. Now, I figured that since people had paid him for his sharpening services for years, he must know what he was doing when it came to putting an edge on a knife, and since I'd only had the knife for about a year (and had never sharpened it since I'd bought it new on base), I'd let him put a professional touch to its dullness.
I should've inspected the apparatus first. The wheel was three inches wide, about two feet in diameter and no more than 36 grit. It wobbled and clacked like a rickety wrecked rail car. This I noticed after I'd handed him my Puma and as he began to rock his foot. I'll never forget that sound, as my blade was plunged into destruction. After the caterwauling ceased, he handed back what was left of my knife. It would undoubtedly have cut through elephant hide, but had lost a good quarter inch of useable steel in the process - and any aesthetic value it had ever had was but a fugitive memory.
So much for Old School...

Raise you hand, guys, if you cringed when you read this! I can't be the only one.

-- Mark

 

[NvG79]

I'll invite you to see this this video by Paul sellers
He is not from the far west, but he started to work at age 16 learning from men who learn the trade in the 19th century so the knowledge of old was pass down to him.
His philosophy is quite eye opening in a lot of areas.
In the video he demonstrates what can be done with only a coarse stone

Thatscool[emoji1360]
Thanks for sharing
I keep liking my mordernpolishedoverkillshiny edge though


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Macchina]

My mother's father was born in 1887. He was a general purpose farmer until after WWII in Arkansas. Like a lot of your forebears, I have a ton of his knives that have blades sharpened to nothing. I have a few with about 80% blades that I treasure. I also have his Washita stone, a carborundum stone with a handle that I believe was used for kitchen and butchering knives, and numerous dished out pocket stones.

He kept his knives very sharp, at a near zero bevel. Probably about as sharp as you can get them using a single, rather coarse stone. Judging from the condition of all his stones, he did this sharpening often.

Maybe not as old as you are asking, but definitely a working farmer. I think knives and whittling were kind of a hobby of his, in addition to the daily hard using he put them to.

That's really cool. He sounds like one of us! Do you know what knife brand was his favorite? Would you happen to have any pictures? Thanks for sharing!

 

[MarkPinTx]

That's really cool. He sounds like one of us! Do you know what knife brand was his favorite? Would you happen to have any pictures? Thanks for sharing!

He didn't have a favorite. I guess it was whatever was on sale or available at the hardware store. No real consistent pattern, either. One thing, though, most of the knives I have are probably post-war, after he stopped farming. He may have had favorites before that. There's a couple of Kabars, Camillus equal end jack (wish this one had more blade), a Schrade Walden 836 with peachseed bone (my favorite, an 80%er), a couple of Wostenholm IXL "Office Knives." All multi-bladed, what you would call "jackknives" even though they aren't true jacks. Nothing stainless, for sure. He did go for pretty solid knives as opposed to Imperial or the like. I'll get some pix up one of these days.

 

[Sidehill Gouger]

It dawned on me I probably had the answer to this question. The steamboat Bertrand sank in the Missouri with all of its cargo in 1865 headed for the frontier in Montana. Whetstones are listed in detail. There were a wide variety of sizes and types. Mostly mica schist from various quarries in the eastern U.S. and Arkansas types from various other locations. Pike manufacturing that eventually became Norton was a common brand. From the book "The Steamboat Bertrand and the Missouri River Commerce."