OKCA Show

[A C Richards]

Well another year has gone by and another OKCA show as well. I went again this year and, well sold to my favorite customer and that was it. But then I only took 3 pieces and low end at that. I usually go to his show with the expectation of visiting rather than selling. Making a sale is always great and thankfully I have one great customer who always comes through. Sitting in my little corner of the world there I had Eric Burgland, Ray Richard and Dave Lisch within spittin distance. Here is a shot of Dave doing business on the phone again.

Dave cleaned up with 3 awards, Best Bowie and Best Damascus and one other that I can't remember right off (oh yea, best fighter I think). He had a table of nice knives but the great ones were under the table reserved for a later date.

Visiting with new faces was also great. Ryan W had a handsome display.

And his bright smiling face

Johnny Mack was also there with his great users showing us how its done.

I did not get many pics. Got to speak to a lot of friends and made a few new ones. Bruce Bump was there and many others.
The highlight of the show for me was seeing John Doyle and his impressive display. I got to his table late and his bowie was already gone. Quick shots to follow.

 

[A C Richards]

Here are some of Johns knives.

and some close ups.

His personal knife in the group picture did not come out right on the close up. This was my personal favorite. Clean, well executed and just an overall great piece. A WINNER in my book.

John's smiling for a good reason, sold most of what he had.

Well I may have not had a huge show but I sure contributed to the economy here is my haul for some future projects.

And I picked these up last year but had to get them out again to take a look.

I had a great time seeing everyone once again. I will be going back since the show is so close and if for nothing else to see old friends once again,

 

[Brian Ayres]

I had a great time too Chuck! I hope you got that counter cleared off before your wife saw it.....

I really enjoyed having three full days to look at everything there. I spent more than I had set aside on materials. Bought my first bit of mammoth....

One favorite moment was when Louis Chow opened his case and started handing me some of his Loveless knives to get to know what a Loveless feels like in the hand. :thumbup::thumbup:

Maybe I can make a few knives for my own table next year.

Many thanks to all the makers who let me pester them for 3 days straight. I forgot to stop and eat Sunday I was having so much fun!

It was great to meet Ryan, Jonny, Ben and the other newer makers.





I gotta say there were many new makers with good knives on the table. I can't wait for next year already!

 

[A C Richards]

Yup, she was at work had it all put away long before she got home. I told her I would be buying some handle material just not how much. I paid most of it off when I got home though. Plus that pearl was paid for last year. Anyway it was good to see you having fun. Did not talk with you much but then we can get together just about anytime. About that handle material, they have a really nice 24 gun safe at the gunshop I might need to buy to put it in. Or then maybe I need a new safe for the guns and put the handle material in the old one, Yea that's it.

 

[Brian Ayres]

I am single, so I just spent all of today yelling at myself for what I bought and wishing I had gotten more!

I'll be coming down soon if you have a free Saturday. I can help you fill the new safe!

I am lpoking forward to hearing from other people how the show went for them!

 

[jonnymac44]

Chuck, thanks for sharing the pictures. It really was a pleasure meeting you and talking for a while. I appreciated your honest opinions and suggestions.

I really had a blast this weekend. Met a bunch of new folks and got to see quite a few friends. Overall a big success!

Brian Ayres, John Doyle, Bruce Bump, Jason Magruder, Eric Ochs, Greg Haile, Bret Mathews, Chuck Richards himself! ......the list goes on. Got to meet lots of great people at the show. I would have mentioned Ryan Weeks, but by the time the show started we'd already spent an entire day and night driving through mountains and snow storms together so I was pretty much done with him already!

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

Awesome photos! I hope everyone sold out!

 

[Horsewright]

Two new safes. Then ya can have more guns and handle materials. Nice pics, great to put faces to names. Any take on how well the show did overall? Seem like things were picking up?

 

[Bruce Bump]

This show for me in the past has seen pretty low sales due to the big spenders not being there. As you probally know most of the big name makers split several years ago and took those big name collectors with them. That said I still love this show because of the people that are there. I've done this one since 1992 missing only a couple years here and there.

Its a split show because of the old timey pocket knives and their crowd and the custom knives and their smaller crowd. We rarely spend time at the pocket knives and they rarely stop and look at our stuff but if you just plain like knives of all and I mean all varieties there is no finer show to see. 425 tables and something interesting on each one. The displays around the edges are a complete bonus and worth the price of admittance just for them alone.

This show belonged to Dave Lisch and well deserved too. He has endless energy which is a good thing because he works his ass off at this and makes some of the most awesome knives in the world.

Kaye and I adopted Brian Ayres as our own. I have a ton of chores for him when he gets moved in.

It was sure nice to meet everybody and thanks for stopping by my table. With my poor memory I'm not even going to try to name them all for fear of forgetting some names.

 

[Patrice Lemée]

Wow Chuck, think you bought enough? Some nice stuff there! :thumbup:

Another thanks for sharing the pics. Great for us who can't attend these shows.

 

[amcardon]

I had a great time at the show as well, really enjoyed meeting a lot of the guys mentioned and getting to play a bit... Spent way too much money and not enough time.

Chuck - I was at John's table when he sold the bowie. Gorgeous knife and the buyer was very excited.

All in all, it was a great show and I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

 

[BenR.T.]

I was wondering where all the good stag was! Looks like some good finds Chuck.
It was a pleasure meeting a bunch of fine folks. I had a great time and even sold a couple knives.
My 3 yr old daughter had a blast, she made out like a bandit in the candy department!!

 

[Jesse Latham]

Chuck, Looks like you took home great handle material. Although I was only able to spend Friday at the show, I found it worth the time and travel. I spend a lot of time at my friend Steve Hughes table as most knife makers stop by to look at the great Koa. It also affords me a little time to pick up pointers from Bruce Bump. I was lucky enough to show most of the custom makers my knives and I appreciate their time and yours with the help it brings. It was a lot of fun to meet some new (to me) makers like Jonny, Ryan, Ben, also makers like Dave L, Ray R, and so many others. Thanks to all for sharing your knowledge with me. It really does shorten the learning curve. Jess

 

[Brian Ayres]

Thanks Bruce, you and Kaye will not be disappointed. I enjoyed getting a peek at your knives. I'm looking forward to moving in and learning all your secrets.
I really wish I had a couple thousand dollars inhand for materials. I was disappointed K&G and Mark-it's a Burl weren't at the show. I really need to pick up some corby bolts etc and some Koa and Redwood burl scales.
Steve's Koa was really nice but I was running out of money and needed gas to get home.
I hope everyone else had as much fun as I did.

 

[mctrinket]

Great photos and it looks like a great time was had by all! I've already scooped up some leftovers from Ben from the show. So I'm very exited about that!

And I'm hoping Jonny Mack has a few leftovers available...

So many great knifemakers there! I would loved to have been there and met you all!

 

[RyanW]

I am still not home, spending another day with Mike Turner Forging out some Damascus. Was a great show and really good to put a bunch of faces to names.

 

[jonnymac44]

Awesome Ryan, hope you guys get a lot done. Can't wait to see your first billets:thumbup:

 

[Mike Turner]

Was a lot of fun to visit with some friends I have not see since last year.

Was a lot of fun with RyanW and Jason Magruder after the show we had a forging class, Ryan missed his flight Tuesday so Ryan had an extra day to do some more forging and we took him to visit Mark (Burl Source) over at It's A Burl since Mark did not make the show.

I know my wife was running around taking pictures at the OKCA show so I will throw up some pictures soon.