I was going through a box of my pocket knives this morning and I found a couple interesting examples, not rare by any means. first was an LB-1, cute little thing. The other is a Craftsman Old Crafty, identical to an old timer and quite obviously made by Schrade. What can anyone tell me about the Craftsman/Schrade romance?
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tongueriver
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They had a long relationship; A good many of the OT's had an analog as Craftsman knives. Craftsman had a very large 12 inch hunting knife that looked just like the little 141 OT bird and trout. It was almost identical in the steel as the Schrade Buffalo Bill Bowie. Three sizes of Stockmans, the 1 & 2 blade folding hunters, and others. Camillus, who was a bed partner with Schrade, also made knives for Craftsman and Buck.
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Codger_64
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Schrade Walden / Schrade / Imperial Schrade was owned by Albert Baer. Albert began his life in the cutlery business working for Adolph Kastor, owner of Adolph Kastor & Bros. / Adolph Kastor & Son / Casmillus. Albert was their prime salesman after starting there circa 1922 until he left in 1939 in a tiff with Alfred Kastor, son and heir of Adolph Kastor. Baer cultivated the Sears account while with Kastor and through his personal relationship with the head hardware buyer of Sears, Tom Dunlap and the cutlery buyer Frank Kethcart, he took the Sears business with him when he bought and ran his own company, Ulster. In fact Frank retired from Sears shiortly after the war and went to work for Baer. Baer continued to sell to Sears until circa 1986 when he turned most of the Sears business back to Camillus. Which he bought in the early sixties from the Kastor family. So we might Say that Baer had the Sears account locked up from the thirties through the Camillus closing in 2007. The heirs of his two daughters were running that company at that time.
Baer first sold Sears Craftsman branded knives during WWII (Craftsman was used on tools prior to that, but not pocket knives) and from then on. Prior to that, Sears branding was Dunlap, Sta-Sharp and Kwik Kut. Old Crafty branding appeared in the sixties. J.C. Higgins was another store brand from the early sixties, mostly used on hunting knives. During that period, Sears also bought hunting knives from Western.
Michael
Thanks Codger, that is a very interesting history, I was just watching a Schrade Bowie with a Sears affiliation sell on ebay, almost bid but didn't know if there was a real connection or the sheath was misrepresented.
Interesting story on the aquisition of the LB1. A few years back I got to sift through a couple tubs of knives taken at airport security and found a few the obvious previous sift had missed. One was the LB1 and a CH3 plus a couple Zippo's, and my tiniest folder. I think they were 25 cents each.
Interesting story on the aquisition of the LB1. A few years back I got to sift through a couple tubs of knives taken at airport security and found a few the obvious previous sift had missed. One was the LB1 and a CH3 plus a couple Zippo's, and my tiniest folder. I think they were 25 cents each.