The most that I ever spent on a knife, when considered as a percentage of my weekly salary, was back in the fall of 1961 when I bought a Randall 6" Hunter's Bowie for $25.00 plus about $1.25 in tax. My weekly salary was, at that time, the grand sum of about $75.00 or so, after deductions for state and federal income tax witholding, so the knife was 1/3 of my net income for the week! Today, that knife sells for about $250.00 and it has whatever the current waiting period is for Randall Made Knives.
BTW, when my parents heard what I had paid for the knife, they were beside themselves. That was until they saw it and my dad handled it for a bit. About two summers later, my sister was a camp counsellor and needed a good knife for her work up in the Great Smokies, so my dad asked me to take her down to the store where I had bought my Randall and see what I could get for her, if at a somewhat more "reasonable" price. We wound up with a Buck, about 4" blade, in one of those old holster-style sheaths that Buck used to use, the ones with the flap that snapped down over the whole knife and protected it from the weather. Sally carried that thing for the next 3-4 summers, as needed, as a counsellor at various camps and came to really like it.
BTW, when my parents heard what I had paid for the knife, they were beside themselves. That was until they saw it and my dad handled it for a bit. About two summers later, my sister was a camp counsellor and needed a good knife for her work up in the Great Smokies, so my dad asked me to take her down to the store where I had bought my Randall and see what I could get for her, if at a somewhat more "reasonable" price. We wound up with a Buck, about 4" blade, in one of those old holster-style sheaths that Buck used to use, the ones with the flap that snapped down over the whole knife and protected it from the weather. Sally carried that thing for the next 3-4 summers, as needed, as a counsellor at various camps and came to really like it.
