What started your addiction

C

CJ1999

Joined
Aug 14, 2003
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I was eight years old when my dad gave me my first knife. It was a little oldtimer with a liner lock, very small. I don't remember what it was exactly, but I have been hooked ever since that day. From that day forward I have bought, lost, and obsessed over knives. My wife cannot understand it, and most of my co-workers cannot as well even though I am in the military. Go figure. Anyway, just curious as to what brought on everyone elses addiction that I have.
 
It started with an Old Timer I bought with my own money, but my interest was really piqued by my granddad and the things he used to carve out of willow branches in the spring.

Than in 1987 I bought my first custom, and my first Spydie, after that it was all over for me, 300+ knives later and I'm still buyin' more.
 
5th bday, my grandfather(who grew up in the "every man needs a good knife" age, and was a farmer until mid 1970s) gave me a small slipjoint. sheffield slipjoint, made in the early 50s, blade is just over an inch long, and I'm not even sure what the original belly was as I learned to sharpen on it(yep, handed a 5yr old a sharp knife, and then taught me how to sharpen freehand)...

still have it put away.

oldest edc is my dad's old one(30+ years). I was shopping for a slipjoint for a family gathering for my other grandparents 50th anny, bought a cheap one a couple week before, and after we got home from it, he found the oldie and gave it to me. Shapened and cleaned up, carry once in a while but not heavy use.

now my edc rotation is about 20 knives, including 3 slipjoints.
 
A small little brass folder with wood inlay my father bought for me when I was 7 while we were in spain.

My mother "lost" it about 2 hours later. She didn't want me to have it. 382 knives later ... I showed her!
 
When I was young I loved to examine (read fondle) my Father's knives, I could look at them for hours. The knives became even more important to me when he died unexpectedly just prior to my thirteenth birthday. I still have his collection and now one of my own as well.
 
My grandfather...He bought me my first knife; a Camillus Boy Scout knife when I was about 10-11 years old.
 
I had knives as a kid... SAK's, Boy Scout multiblades, etc.

Grandpa bought me a Buck 110 (440C in late 70's)... he paid $2 to some drunk who needed a bottle. I still have it. Perhaps my most cherished knife, although I don't use or carry it (heavy, blocky, brass gets green in sheath, etc).

But what got me HOOKED, was recent. I think it was about 1997 now. Decided I wanted a good folder for self defense and utility. Bought an issue of Tactical Knives (RIP), and it had an article about Chris Caracci. Knife looked good, reports on BM were good, ATS-34 was the rage, so the 812, part serrated, was my first good quality folder. Still have it. Has a good heat treat on the ATS-34. Some of the recent 154Cm from BM acts weird (hard to sharpen, hard to get a good edge on... weird).
 
Stared @ Gerber Yari, knew I had to have it. (That and I had a few Japanese Knife mags laying around)
 
I'm a slow learner. It took 3 seperate episodes before I finally got it and was able to stand up and say 'my name is Ming, and I'm a knifeknut.

1) 8 years old. Getting a small Vic SAK as a prize in a knot tying competition in boy scouts. I used to throw it against the fence and make it stick 2 out of 3 times till I broke the blade tip. Continued to use and abuse it for years afterwards. Sad that I don't still have it.

2) 22 years old. Guy I was working for in California and I used to take used lift tickets from people leaving the ski slopes early and wire them onto our jackets (dude is a multi-millionaire but an amazing scrooge). He pulled out a Leatherman tool to do this and it was lust at first sight.

3) 30 years old. Finding a G10 handled Spydie lying on the rocks near the ocean. Taking it to a knife collector and realising it was worth some money. Traded him for a Delica. Getting hooked on the whole clipit-one hander idea.

Finally the un-spoken became spoken. "Hey, I love knives"
 
Originally posted by CJ1999
Anyway, just curious as to what brought on everyone elses addiction that I have.
Click to expand...
This blasted site. My bank account rues the day I first clicked on it. ;)
 
I got a slip joint cub scout knife when I was little and managed to cut the stink out of myself when the darn thing accidentally closed on my finger. It was a revelation when I discovered the Buck 110 lockback. I carried one of those until it was stolen. My first "folder" in the sense that we know them today was a Gerber Spectre. I still have it, but it is no longer in my EDC rotation. Then while on the quest for something "better", I discovered Benchmades, Spydercos....etc.

T.
 
Bellamy17 wrote:
This blasted site. My bank account rues the day I first clicked on it.
Click to expand...
Amen. I treated myself to a SAK Super Tinker in college and got used to having an EDC blade. Later, I got a SAK Manager. Later, I got a LM Wave and discovered locking blades. I poked around on the 'net and before I knew it, I clicked on this site. And that was all she wrote.
 
we would always spend summers at our property ti NC. my dad was a school teacher, so he had all summer off.

my dad was also an avid knife collector/carrier.

he got me started. probably aroung 6-8 for my first knife, used to have bowie/survival knife types always straped to me. Rambo was the big thing, so i guess that is where the survival knife thing came from.

kind of got out of knives for s while, then my dad passed away... and i inherited lots. got me back into it full swing.

my dad had lots of great older knives that his dad had passed to him. have many knives that are from 1900's - 1920's.

when i get around the knives, it makes me really miss Dad.
 
My Grandfather would buy me fleamarket knives and Mr. Steven Dick and his great publication which gave me a a higher education in knife selection. Ahh those were the days.
 
When I was young (probably 6 or 7) my dad would usually carry a small Buck knife with him. I really wanted one, and one day my dad took me to the mall where we went into a small tobaco shop that sold knives. I picked out a small black Buck knife and he bought it for me. I still have that knife today. When I got to my early teens I would buy a few knives here and there from Wal-Mart and I started reading Blade magazine (my mom hated that I would buy magazines about knife:) It just grew from there.
 
It all started around a campfire. I was 4 years old. My father took out his "pocket knife" (today I would call it an EDC, but this was a long time ago) and cut a small branch for me to heat some marschmallows...

I wanted to do it myself. He said ok, be careful. My mom saw that, and took the knife away from me. That's probably the first time I really got frustrated in my life!

After that thay, I started asking for a knife, and kept on asking until my mother finally agreed (she probably got very tired of hearing me asking and whining every 10 minutes). She said "Ok, stop bugging me, but you'll pay it yourself". That was all I needed to hear. I started mowing lawns, and stuff, until I got 10$ to get a "decent" knife :). 10$ is a long time of work for a kid that gets paid 25 cents an hour... :) I asked my mother to drive me to the sports store, and I carefully chose a nice little pocket knife, with a cheap handle but nice 1 1/2" carbon steel blade (I didn't know anything about blades at that time, of course, but looking back, that little EDC was a great choice ;) ). Actually this was the largest, meanest knife I could buy myself for 10 bucks... :cool:

Just when I had got it, with the little box and everything, my mother took the knife from my hands, and asked for a sharpening stone. Then she unsharpened it, right there before my horrified eyes. She said it was very dangerous. I just couldn't believe it. This is where I got really maniac. I learned to re-sharpen it, and maintain it. I oiled the blade every day, and I carefully kept it concealed so that the "authorities" did not get it... ;)

My next knife was a little two bladed scout's knife. Then a few SAK's, then a few cheap fixed blades, machetes... All that before the age of 12. Then, with adolescence (and more decently paid slavery) my first real blades : a buck skinner, a spydie or two, a few fighting blades... All my money went to knives.

I never smoked, drank or got into trouble... I had no money left for that. Maybe it was not that bad after all...

Then, of course, McGuyver got me buying SAK's, and Rambo got me buying large survival knives... Then came Predator, with Schwarzy, and I got interested in large, good quality machetes (you know, like the one the Indian guy cuts his chest with when he stops and turn around for the predator to get him... What a cool knife!!!)

I don't have so many knives, now. Probably less than 20 (I sell them, give them away, or break them... I don't really mind), but all top quality (except a few opinels that are good and cheap). I am really maniac about them. They are always razor sharp and ready to use, and a won't let anyone use them.

My girlfriend thinks I'm crazy. She just can't understand why I love my knives so much. I guess she's jalous ;) I must admit I don't know myself. It's just a part of me, I guess. I feel great around here. I feel less alone ;)

Let's start the anonymous knifeaholics ;)
 
Until 1974 I owned various knives. My feeling for them was that they were mere tools, and several I abused away to nothing. The first one I really treasured was a Buck General I got in 1974 at the San Francisco Gun Exchange.

What really changed things was a picture I saw of an EK Commando knife. I saw the ad in 1989 and fell in love. I got one, and still have it. I will never let go of it. It has a lovely blade, and those three brass 4 slotted screws---I look at it now and then, and take it on my trips to the mountains and deserts.

Since then I have gotten knives when money and liking are enough. Now my collection weighs about 120 pounds.

The best ones? The Ek, the HI kukries, and the Blackjacks. The Westerns I got before their 1991 bankruptcy. Some real jewels from A.G. Russel, and the Gryphons. The Chris Reeve Project II, and good old knives from the glory days past of Cold Steel.
 
I can't remember if it was First Blood (my family was close friends with Sly's bodyguard and combat consultant, so my father took me to see it in the theatre) or earlier. My father also bought me a big Western M49 Bowie, apparently to tick off my mother.
I still have that knife, and many more.
 
I've been carrying a knife since I was 7, but I didn't come to terms with my addiction until I bought a Benchmade Ares. That knife broke the barrier to better knives for me and showed me how much I really like knives and inspired me to give up the fight and just give in to the knife-collecting desires.
 
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