(I read all the novels when I was in junior high school.)
I grew up on Edgar Rice Burroughs as well in the early 60's. Not just his Tarzan series, but his Pellucidar (Center of the Earth), Mars and Venus series of books. It's hard to say what knife Burroughs pictured in his mind for Tarzan, but the blade had to be large enough to penetrate the hearts of large carnivores and hominoids. Most of his early first editions did not have illustrations, but some of his later ones did. Here's one from a first edition of
Tarzan and the Foriegn Legion copywrite 1947. The knife in the illustration may have come from the mind of the iillustrator, but it had to have been approved by Burroughs:
As an aside, there was a story-telling contest on a Randall forum back in 2004 and this was my entry. I got a kick writing it:
It was one of countless incidences of violence that played out in nature's game of survival in the African jungle every day. The great ape mother had been momentarily been distracted by a large beetle and set down and turned away from her infant son. The leopard had been waiting patiently at the edge of the clearing for just such an opportunity and sprang the few yards necessary to seize her pray and then vanish into the dense foliage.
My father had always been an avid hunter from the time it was a necessity to put food on the table to later in his life when money was not an object and the act became a challenging sport. It had been almost two years before I was born that he had taken a safari into Africa and he felt that both my mother and myself were now able to safely accompany him. Armed with his 300 Weatherby magnum and a knife made by a man named Randall reputed to be the finest ever made, he set off with Mother and I in tow on a sequence of flights that terminated in Capetown. There he chartered a small boat and we headed up the West African coast. I heard Mother nervously whisper to Father that the crewman looked nefarious which meant nothing to me at the time, but whatever he said seemed to reassure her and we ventured on. Several nights later, we were wakened by the three crewman clutching wicked looking machetes and showing rotten teeth in hideous grimaces. It was over before either Mother and I could even fully comprehend our peril. Father had been a blur and the three villains were dispatched and laying askew on the cabin floor. The sighs of relief had barely passed our lips when there was a deafening sound and simultaneous jolt. Father grabbed us both and took us on deck. We've hit a submerged rock, he said calmly. Get into the lifeboat and I'll be along as soon as I gather some things.
The tree house my father built at the edge of the jungle with the aid of that wonderful knife wasn't big, but it was high enough to escape the menacing glares of large carnivores that would smell our scent and hungrily stare up at us every night. During the day, my father would forage for food and water and be ever ready to light the signal fire should another boat steam by. One day Mother grew ill with a high fever and Father could do nothing but bathe her forehead with cool water. A look of despair came over his face that I had never seen before. Mother grew worse, soon becoming incoherent and finally as her chest stopped rising and falling I heard loud grunts and screeches in the trees near us. My Father snapped out of his daze just in time to greet the onslaught of the first of a number of large bull apes. My father was a strong man, but these creatures weighed near 200 kilos and he was no match. Several of them were gravely wounded by the wielding of his Randall, but in the end he went down. As the largest bull turned and started to approach me snarling, a female ape stepped in between us and seemed to go berserk. The next thing I knew I was dizzily swinging through the upper reaches of the forest with my face pressed against the female apes pungent hair. My surrogate mother continued to obsessively protect and teach me the ways of the jungle until the band of great apes finally accepted me.
I must have been about twelve when we happened to run across the tree house during a day of foraging. I was always the most curious of the lot and soon found myself inside the cool shaded interior. There were many objects I had vague memories of including father's diary, but the Randall knife captured my attention to the exclusion of everything else. Just before I cut myself and in the process began to understand the true potential of the weapon, I noticed the sheath stone pocket was still firmly attached to the otherwise rotting leather of the sheath itself identified by the word Heiser on the back.
Despite my youth and inferior strength, my higher intellect and that Randall knife made me an equal to any of the other bulls and they soon learned that to antagonize me would result in days of their suffering. As I grew older, stronger and more adept in the ways of the jungle, my Randall afforded both the means of filling my belly and defense from the larger predators. It became routine to drop from a tree limb on to the back of a boar or deer wandering along a game trail, encircling their neck with my right hand and driving the Randall blade into their vitals. Many a lion and tiger were disposed of the same way, but this was always somewhat less of a routine.
One day as I wandered far from the band as I was want to do when I was older, I heard noises in the distance. Moving downwind, I approached from the advantage of the forest heights and what I saw piqued my curiosity: The noise was some type of speech emanating from two beings that resembled myself! It turns out that they were Aussie and Canadian friends out on Safari together. I won't bore you with what transpired after this, but suffice to say I was reunited with my father's inheritance, found a lovely bride and had Clarence Moore make me a new sheath for my beloved Randall.
Best,
