"Old Knives"

67nick said:
Here is my of my personal favorites in my collection, it's kind of like a cross between a sway back and a congress jack. This one has great bone covers and an extra long sheepsfoot main with a nice longpull. It's the only piece I have from the maker, Caldwell Mfg Co Indianapolis. The Caldwell Manufacturing Co, was listed in the Indianapolis City directory in the early 1900’s. A.B. Caldwell worked for the Van Camp Hardware Company. An advertisement for Van Camp in 1914 listed Caldwell Cutlery. The company was in existence from 1910-1929.

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Wow that is a beaut'! I am from Indiana and lived in Indianapolis for a while. I really need to track one of these down! Very nice.
 
According to Levine, Caldwell was an importer and wholesaler of German made knives.

Best regards

Robin
 
I picked up a pretty neat Remington at the antique shop. The guy who owned the booth said he thought it to be from around the 1920's. You can see it's well used but the action is great, the springs have a ton of life left in them and I think the patina is great.





 
Wimberly - Thomas Hardware was one of three local Birmingham jobber firms, along with Moore - Handley and Long - Lewis.

Moore - Handley became Home Crafters, but I do not think they are still in business. Could not compete with Home Depot and Lowes.

Long - Lewis evolved into a Ford dealership and are still in business, doing quite well.

Wimberly - Thomas existed from 1900 until 1944. Their large painted logo remained on their building on the Southside of Birmingham for many years, might still be there. I'll have to check.

All three of these firms sold knives. Moore - Handley knives are frequently found. I have one and bought and sold three mint etched examples a couple of years ago. They were in my possession less than two days.

I've never seen a Long-Lewis marked knife, but the Ford dealership has photos of the old hardware showroom with many pocketknives displayed on boxes in a wood and glass display case. Maybe they were other known brands.

I have a nice Wimberly-Thomas razor and box. A local dealer/collector has shown me a Wimberly - Thomas stamped bone handled English jack in NKCA "good" condition. He has stated it is the only one he's ever seen. A member on another forum posted a coke bottle folding hunter in 2011 with a Wimberly - Thomas stamp and I saw a similar, if not the same, knife on Ebay about the same time.

There are avid collectors of Birmingham hardware marked knives in this area.

So, when I came across this one on Ebay, I bookmarked it and made a bid just before auction's close.

I won it, but it wasn't cheap. There was only one other bidder.

The knife is not great, but nice. There's some blade wear. One pearl handle is cracked.

But, there's a beautiful deep etch on the master. It's a four bladed, pearl handled gentleman's pocket knife.

I consider this an extremely rare stamp.

I'm speculating on this and my plans are to roll this over to one of the local collectors.

These are auction photos:













 
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Very cool knife. I absolutely love those vintage knives featuring the deep etch, just adds that little extra something to the knife.
 
Love the deep etch on that one, Charlie!
 
Wow that was fast! Thank you much. I haven't any knowledge on the company. Decent knife, or pretty mediocre?
 
ROBESON
Shur Edge
ROCHESTER

Made in Rochester, NY, between WWI and WWII. High quality knives.
 
Shipped from Rochester, but made in Perry, New York, as that was where the factory was from 1900 until 1965.

Nice, honest old knife.
 
Thanks for the info Charlie, I had to look it up. Perry is about 35 miles southwest of Rochester.

Thanks for the pics, Funkenstein, nice knife, should clean up beautifully.
 
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