"Old Knives"

That older Japanese multiblade is commonly seen on ebay and comes in 2 sizes: large & small. I have at least one of each but cannot find them to measure. Very few people bid for these so the usual ebay price is low. I have never tried to cut anything or sharpen the blade, but all of the tools have nice W&T on the examples i have. I believe they were imported in late '50's-early '60's, before the cutlery industry in Japan had fully recovered from WW II.
kj
 
Thanks. It does look like something made by folks with a lot of skill, but limited resources, so post-war era makes sense.
 
The word Yarden is the Hebrew name of (River) Jordan. These knives were common in Israel during 70's, I had one as a boy scout. Though they were not manufactured in Israel, mostly in Japan. As I recall some blades were nail breaker :rolleyes:

Mike
 
Thanks, Mike. Here in the states, I saw lots of scout knives back then. Spear blade plus can opener, bottle opener, and awl. A few with a spoon and fork, but nothing like this behemoth! :eek: A few of the tools are mighty hard to open, but I haven't gone after it with the wd-40, yet.

I wonder if they were imported directly, or sent along with all those cards full of quarters we collected to buy trees. ;)
 
My wife discovered an old girl scout knife of mine tonight. Pretty sure it is hers now.
 
Bought this Imperial scout, basically sight unseen, for lunch money. Looked like decent enough Rogers bone.

As it turns out, it's one of the more blatant cobbled-together parts knives I've seen. The mark side scale has a cutout for the older-style can opener, while the knife sports the newer patent opener with a HUGE kink in it :rolleyes: In addition, there is no awl as I would likely expect on this knife. However, the knife has great snap on all implements and no blade play, looks very tight overall. Whoever dun cobbled it did a good job! It threw me for a curve but I am actually quite pleased with it.

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My Friend- That Sir ^^^^^ is a BEAUTY! I just LOVE that old Bone, and I too would be happy with that knife - and for lunch money!!!!! Well Done!
Speaking of Lunch Money, this little knife cost me possibly TWO days lunch money :), I was intrigued by this knife the first time I saw the very rough photo's of it, if you can spare me a moment can I tell you why...
The knife has absolutely beautiful Pearl, the Stampings on the knife say Richard Glasgow on the Mark side on the main Blade, the reverse has no stampings.
Now the smaller blade ( on the left - Mark side ) has the first letter partly obscure by the cut of the Tang possibly a P followed by ( I have used a loup and the letters look very clean to read... ) LLLLTS PATENT. The reverse of this blade also has RICHARD GLASGOW stamped on the Tang.

I do know of Richards in England whom manufactured thousands of extremely cheaply built knives, BUT .... this knife is not the Richards that we know, this is one very well built knife.

The knife is small - under 3 inches closed, and the wee fine pins and beautiful Pearl, Nickel Silver Shield and pins tell you that this is a nice knife.
What also interests me incredibly is the "Easy open" notches this wee knife has on each side- in total four, and the Easy Open ( one handed ) wee caps on the spine of the knives - there are NO nail nicks, and these caps have not been added as a later thought - and when you look closely with a Magnifying Glass - the Soldering job on the caps is insanely fine and some of the most excellent work you could ever appreciate to see.

I can find no reference to a Richards or Richard Glasgow in the first edition of Geoffrey Tweedale's "The Sheffield book", and I suspect that the Richards may not even be a Cutler but perhaps a retail outlet/Firm of sorts. Apparently J.P Richards made Bowie Type Knives as well as other Cutlery.

I remember fondly the one and only Mr Stan Shaw telling his lucky audience Sue, Jack and myself on just how EXPENSIVE Pearl was- in fact THE most expensive material, and what skill it took to make the knives using this material, ever since then I started to buy and appreciate Pearl knives.The skill to make such a fine, intricate knife with the Pearl Scales and beautiful Pin work would command an experienced Master Cutler of the day to put this knife together - even the wee Shield is pinned!

I also note with this knife that the Swedges are so finely and magnificently cut - something you would imagine on a earl E.C Simmons Keen Kutter blade of sorts, anyway end of Rave, here are some extremely horrible indoor shots as it is pretty wet a Gloomy here :(

Hope you like the knife everyone..

STOP PRESS!!:eek::eek::eek::D I found it - J.P Richard, Glasgow is in Goins ( p230)















 
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Duncan, that is a true gem!!! Fiery, deep Pearl, those nubs to open the blades are unlike anything I've ever seen before? Very very unique knife my friend:cool::thumbup:
 
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What a elegant pearl, Duncan! Interesting studs/pearls used to open the blades. They give the whole knife another dimension in class.
 
Great find Duncan, congratulations my friend :thumbup:
 
Your enthusiasm is contagious, Duncan! What an awesome find. I do hope you can discover more about that fine little knife.
 
Beautiful mop knife Duncan. It's a quality piece for sure. Thanks for showing it. Richard, Glasgow must be a retailer's mark. I've seen similar blades with tabs on top for opening somewhere but can't quite remember at the moment.
 
Thank you for the very kind comments guys, hey...lets be honest - its far from the best knife in the world, the comments about the wee openers are exactly what stopped me to look further at this knife - thinking " wow"..." this is something different" I can only assume and hope that I am right to think that the "nubs" are original to the knife - as there are no nail nicks, the workmanship with the placing of them coincides with the easy opener notches.

When I have this wee knife in my hands, and you look at the detail - as you do - you appreciate the workmanship and having go through the Sheffield Museum with Jack - the absolute HARD toil by both men and woman the achieve such outcomes as this - its a humbling experience visiting that amazing place, and it is an experience of contrast where such awful and hard labourious conditions with the grinders, the polishers, the Crucible Steel workers- all that going on - perhaps not so with this knife- but then again perhaps so - and at the end of the manufacture line of all that intense labour is by a Master Cutler - someone like Stan Shaw to put together with such skills to assemble and fine tune this knife - Thats what is making this type of knife extremely interesting - but to people like Charles ( Chuko ) Jake ( Supratentorial ) Steve ( Smiling Knife ) Mike ( Mike Robuck ) Jack ( Jack Black ), Mick ( Wellington ) who KNOW very well by owning such ( and far better ) fine and beautiful Sheffield pieces...... they know so much better than myself the whole package that comes with such beautiful knives that have been displayed here on this and on Micks Thread.

Edit: - S-K, Thank you for that, I too thought that the RICHARD, Glasgow was a Retailer ? - but found in Goins ( Page 230 ) RICHARD, GLASGOW whom Goins sates that they were a company who made Bowie Type Knives and other Cutlery.
 
Duncan, I wish I knew a lot, lot more about Sheffield knives. Visiting the Sheffield Museum and speaking with Stan Shaw must have been like going to grad school for you. But like you said the people here have been great about posting fine examples and sharing their knowledge. I also like that you mentioned what a tough job and working environment it was back in the day. They sure did toil over making these knives, and it took a steady hand to so those swedges on a knife like yours!
 
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