What was your "gateway" knife?

I've honestly carried knives since first grade, but the one that got my collecting gene kick-started was an 1876 Chassepot bayonet and a WW2 Mk2 Kabar for $5 each in the College Station, TX Army surplus store in 1975.
 
Spyderco Tenacious is what got me into knives! Couldn't be happier, then a volt 2 and now I'm EDC'ing a S30V Blur which is amazing!
 
I've been knife crazy since I was very young, but the one that got me started really collecting is the Kershaw 1431 G10 Wild Wild Turkey. Now I have 130+ Kershaw/ZTs, plus a few each of Spyderco (including a Tenacious), Benchmade, Microtech, CRKT, etc.
 
Paramilitary 1 id owned several bucks shrades and gerbers but that one got my addiction started
 
I collected knives as a kid, and then stopped. I started whittling about a year ago due to having lots of extra olive wood from pruning my olive trees, and saw a gorgeous Case medium congress knife from 1977 in an antique store. It was unused and he was asking $65 for the knife, so I bought it. I instantly fell in love with the superb quality. I had never really noticed how nice the old Case knives were until seeing that one, and I was instantly hooked on nice pocket knives. Since then I have managed to amass a collection of over 100 pocket knives, with about 95% being American made. I eventually discovered GEC, and realized that if I wanted that classic quality they are the company to beat. I also discovered the Queen made Winchester knives from the 1980's and 1990's, which are superb.

What happened later was my addiction to stag handled knives. I bought this Queen-made Winchester stag handled beauty, and was instantly hooked. That ended up making an already expensive hobby a lot more expensive. This has been my EDC for at least 6 months now.

Whatever...it's only money, and I would rather not leave it for the government to steal from me.

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My Mom and Dad got me a SAK on a trip as a gift. Then I got a cheap Winchester linerlock. Then a cheap S&W Linerlock. Then I discovered Amazon and with it Spyderco, Cold Steel, and Leatherman. Goodbye, money...
 
Kershaw volt and Kershaw chill. Opened my eyes to brands instead of just random chinese knives found at gunshows. I quickly upgraded to Spydercos, Benchmades, and now Microtechs.
 
Like many others here, I have loved knives sense I was a small boy. The one that started the full on knife hoarder status was one I made myself. It all started when a friend I had not seen for a long while came into the shop I worked at. I told him I had started making a knife and he said " I am making knives too. Have you checked out Bladeforums?" Me, "No" Him, "You should join.I'm on there." Sooooo that is how it started. Now I am seriously thinking of selling my car so I can buy a mill.If you think buying knives is expensive, try buying knife making tools :D I do not regret any of it!
 
I had knives for my whole childhood and was happy with SAKs and wall mart specials.......then I got gifted a small Sebenza. My bank account has paid dearly for it ever since!
 
The first knife I really wanted and spent time to research it and then find it was the Buck 186 Titanium Lockback, took me two years to find it.

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opinel carbon steel no. 10. makes me wonder is more expensive means excelling this in cutting.
 
The Spyderco Delica ffg/Kershaw e-z out, Nutnfancy let me know that there are a hell of a lot of cool knives out there, besides the swiss army knife I've always had. back then I was really nervous to use them or let people borrow them (they were top of the line;)). Five years later (today) I'm using a 1 day old Curtiss f3 to cut plastic off of 304 stainless stock, and pry open a lodged wooden frame bathroom window at the machine shop I work at, and then letting my coworker work out a splinter with it. While this is going on my girlfriend is borrowing my swamprat ratmandu, esee izula, Ontario rat 1, and vic pioneer to use on a camping trip with her girlfriends, didn't even think twice about it...even touched the edges up for her.
 
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This photo shows a progression of my carry knives over a period of over 40 years. At some point I got knives with one-hand opening, then pocket clips, then liner locks. I've gotten into knives more and more with each one I purchased so it is hard to pick a single one that was the gateway. Not pictured is my Gerber LST, it is one that got me into what I considered to be more interesting knives. The mini-AFCK is one of the first ones that had all of the modern features and it was at that point that I started buying a lot of different knives.

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I bought a beautiful Gerber model 525 about 20 years ago then nothing, then I bought a nasty Walmart buck with a really bad liner lock and gave it away, then I bought a Caly3 CF and the hook was set.

Still have the Gerber


and the Caly

 
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