My first old ebony knife, an LF&C -- and a black composite Imperial jack

Doug Add

Doug Add

Joined
Jan 9, 2012
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As you can see from the pictures this one needs some work, but it is in overall good condition. After snapping these pics I filed the kick on the pen blade to lower it in the frame, and improved the edge to remove the bites. I did not have time to work on the spear blade. At 3.3125" closed it is a very good size for me.

I wanted to post these earlier, just after I took them, but my laptop is in final throes of death, so I am having to move everything over to an ancient desktop pc until I can get to the Apple store and obtain a new MacBook Pro.

LFCa.jpg


LFCb.jpg


LFCc.jpg


LFCd.jpg


The Imperial jack is in post #15.
 
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That's a beauty!

Nothing like that old ebony. Do the blades have half stops?

Glenn
 
Thank you Glenn and Kevin.

The spear does. The pen is lazy all the way through, no snap open or shut, no half stop.

It will be a user for sure, but I got it mainly for the old dark ebony wood. I have no idea of this knife's date, other than what I have read about Landers, Fray & Clark manufacturing slip joints between 1912-1950.
 
That's a great one Doug. It amazing to me how well ebony holds up over time, the wood on that still looks amazing. Nice score.

Ben
 
LF&C did well when they started with the pocketknife manufacturing in 1916 (they were already a major player in kitchen cutlery). They bought out H&B and used their works. I wonder if they retained some H&B employees, too.
 
I agree with Ben. It's amazing how well ebony holds up. I really need to get one with ebony covers some day. Very nice, and even better you're going to use it! That's the best type of knife, one that gets to live out it's life doing what it was made to do.
 
Nice find Doug, that has become my favorite blade configuration as of late. The pen blades come to such a nice point on those old Jacks.
 
Beautiful tough ebony. No gaps in the bolsters or liners over time. That wood hasn't budged, only gained some character. Great find Doug!
 
Thanks for all the kind words. The wood is in great shape. Except for one small crack at the top pin on the mark side, it is flawless and the grain is beautiful (the dark spot near the back pin on the mark side must be a shadow or something that was on the handle when I took the photograph. It is not a spot on the handle).

There are some slight gaps between liners and springs at the non-pivot end, but not bad. A tiny bit of light can be seen through the one between the spear blade spring and liner if the knife is held at just the right angle, none can be seen though the others.

No blade play at all.

I am quite pleased.
 
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It has been a good end of the week for receiving black jack knives. This 1940s-1950s Imperial arrived in today's mail, but I was gone all day and not able to open it until just a short while ago.

At 3.5" closed it is slightly longer than the LF&C, and the serpentine frame is probably my favorite for a jack knife.

Imperialjacka.jpg


Imperialjackb.jpg


Another nice thing about these two, together they set me back not much over $20.
 
At just 0.3125" wide, the Imperial is the thinnest two spring knife I own, another nice feature for someone who prefers smaller knives.
 
ranchmanben said:
I just noticed the nickel silver liners. Man that looks classy with the ebony covers.

Ben
Click to expand...

My monitor isn't that great so I can't tell for sure - are they nickel silver or iron? When this knife was made, it was common to have iron bolsters and liners in budget line knives.
 
Great looking knives. I really like that Imperial. The wood looks like it's in great shape for a 60+ year old knife.
 
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