Nessmuk Knife

Joined
Aug 3, 2000
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232
This is for the Nessmuk fans out there. In Woodcraft and Camping he mentions the knife he uses. However I read the book a long time ago and I can't remember what kind of knife it is. Anybody know or have pictures or a link?
 
He doesn't say a lot but he echos what most old timey woodsman say: thin is in. Most of these guys use an axe or hatchet to chop. The knife was meant for whittling and food and game prep. You don't need a thick knife for that. Here is Nessmuk: "A word as to knife or knives. These are of prime necessity, and should be of the best, both as to shape and temper. The "bowies" and "hunting knives" usually kept on sale, are thick, clumsy affairs, with a sort of ridge along the middle of the blade, murderous-looking, but of little use; rather fitted to adorn a dime novel of the belt of "Billy the Kid," than the outfit of the hunter. The one shown in the cut is thin in the blade [imagine something that looks like an old hickory butcher knife with a bone handle], and handy for skinning, cutting meat, or eating with. The strong double-bladed pocket knife is the best model I have yet found, and, in connection with the sheath knife, is all sufficient for camp use."

Nessmuk preferred a double-bit hatchet for chopping: "But I prefer the double blade. I want one thick, stunt edge for knots, deers' bones, etc., and a fine, keen edge for cutting clear timber."

Makes sense to me.
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Hoodoo

I get some pleasure from finding a relentlessly peaceful use for a combative looking knife.
JKM
 
Here's Nessmuk's blades:

nessmuksknives2.jpg


The Marbles Expert in the link posted by boyscout was highly favored by the famous outdoorsman Calvin Rutstrum and was featured in his book "Paradise Below Zero" which is still in print.

Rutstrum, like Nessmuk before him, favored the thin blade. But the Marbles Expert isn't really a thin blade. I forget the stock thickness but all of my Marbles mic at 0.215 and I imagine the Expert is the same. That's some pretty thick stock. But I think what they were really railing against was the shallow V grind or what Rutstrum referred to as a chisel grind. I'm sure they preferred a full flat grind or convex grind, which will give you a much thinner edge than a shallow V grind.

This from Calvin Rutstrum's book, "The New Way of the Wilderness": "The thick chisel-edged belt knives, which are generally sold, are of little value in the wilderness. Get your belt knife too thin rather than too thick. Line the sheath with sheet aluminum so that the knife will not cut through it. Fold a sheet of aluminum over the back of the knife; cut it to fit the shape of the blade, but slightly wider, and then drill a row of holes along the edge. Then cut off several short stubs of copper wire, insert them in the holes, and peen down the ends to form rivet heads."

Hey, I don't need no stinking kydex.
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Hoodoo

I get some pleasure from finding a relentlessly peaceful use for a combative looking knife.
JKM
 
I think that the closest one can come now is the Cold Steel Red River knife which is discontinued but often on sale on ebay. Pics are here:
http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/Rapids/5404/survival/rr.html

It's a pretty thin blade with good taper toward the tip.
I always wondered about the constant curve to Nessmuk's blade but after trying a CS Twistmaster drop point - such a blade works surprisingly well.
Even more interesting than his knives is Nessmuk's hatchet - I always look at the scale compared to the knives and think it to be much smaller than hatchets now. Kephart mentions that his own "pocket axe" had a 10oz head.
 
Jimbo, that's a kickbutt page you have there. I've always wondered what those knives looked like. I have a Green River knife that looks a lot like it only it's stainless.

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Hoodoo

I get some pleasure from finding a relentlessly peaceful use for a combative looking knife.
JKM
 
I had an original Marble's Expert, a 5" model. The blade was quite a bit thinner than a Woodcraft. A nice meat knife.

I like the Cold Steel Red River and Hudson Bay knives- a quality cheap product. Wish they would reintroduce them. They are starting to get way overpriced for a used butcher knife
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GLP,
So you're saying that the earlier Marbles were thinner? If so, that would explain a lot of things. Do you know what the thickness was?


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Hoodoo

I get some pleasure from finding a relentlessly peaceful use for a combative looking knife.
JKM
 
Actually, I'm saying the Expert model was thinner. I believe the woodcraft and the Ideal and most others were pretty thick. If my memory serves me, the Expert I owned was something like .125" thick. This pattern was designed for handling game carcasses I believe. I liked it a lot, worked nearly as good as a good old butcher knife
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The Russell Green river knife blades as offered by jantzsupply.com ( click on Product Search )or kovalknives.com will give you a quality carbon steel blade for less than 10 bucks. Also the Frosts Mora knives made in Sweden are quality cheap knives. For cutting up a deer or elk you can't do any better. A thin blade is much more useful for camp use than a thick one.

Also ragweedforge.com has lots of knives and blades to buy.
 
The "Nessmuk" knife is now being produced by David R. Beck. The pattern was enlarged directly from the picture in the book by Nessmuk. Altough no dimensions of the origional knife were ever given in all my research, these knives have been reproduced in very exacting detail otherwise & are the most accurate pieces to be found. They are made from differentially tempered high carbon tool steel with a steel washer-type bolster & american deer antler handle that's aged for an old-time worn look.
The shape of the blade was very common for woodsmens knives of those times. It allowed for a very aggressive cut without binding. Blade thickness was generally thin. About 1/8" or .125. In the old days when woodsmen
lived in the woods & used their knives on a daily basis to make their living, knives were generally found to have different features than what you will find today. Thin-bladed, light weight knives that would hold a very sharp egde is what was required. They needed knives that would cut. They were practical, efficient & had all the strength that was needed to hold up to the tasks they were used for. When it came to more strenuous tasks, the belt axe was used.
The do-it-all single knife concept that you frequently see today is ok for short term or forced survival needs to keep one alive, but the woodsmen of old all learned from experience that several knives of different sizes were more suitable to cover the many different tasks that were encountered than just one. Our modern woodsmen can learn something of this if they take the time to study the past & why knives were designed differently years ago.
 
Some years ago there was an article in one of the knife magazines, perhaps it was Fighting Knives, about a knife built to a design by Tom Brown of The Tracker School fame. Are you that person Mr. Beck?

Also, there is a gentleman from Oklahoma named Reeve, who built for me a two bit Nessmuck hatchet exactly like the one in the picture included in this thread. Workmanship is excellent, and it fits in my 1000 cublc inch survival pack. I do not remember either his first name or any additional contact information, largely because my Apple Newton crashed and burned a few years ago with all my data. However, I have seen his advertisements in the magazine traditional archer. He does excellent work.
 
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