Why Bowie gets all the love and not Hudson Bay

You're right. The first american companies would be Harrington (1818) and Russell / Green river (1834). So, before that it was all trade blades, mainly made in Sheffield. Butcher knife blanks, locally handled, and some Sheffield cutler made luxury hunting knives for rich people.
 
Bowie has an American legend attached to it.

Hudson's Bay only means anything to Canadians... And to most (who have no idea of history), think it's just a dying department store.
 
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herisson said:
You're right. The first american companies would be Harrington (1818) and Russell / Green river (1834). So, before that it was all trade blades, mainly made in Sheffield. Butcher knife blanks, locally handled, and some Sheffield cutler made luxury hunting knives for rich people.
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You know I've read that "butcher knife blanks locally handled" thing many times but I have never found any documentation of it. Sheffield provided butchers in several different types of wood along with bone and something called "shambuck."
 
I have read the blanks were imported and transported to local trade points in bundles. The final owner bought as many blanks as needed / wanted and handled them as he could or saw fit. In a trading context this makes total sense : less weight to carry to market, less choices to offer. I'm sure, in paralell to this, there were fully finished knives available. In a higher price range, of course. Wood / bone / horn were current handles in England / Europe. The "shambuck" ? that's intriguing... Could be a sort of leather handle.
 
Wouldn't this be almost a sword ? Notice the upward angled handle. There was some slashing intended...
g9C0W4j.jpg
 
herisson said:
I have read the blanks were imported and transported to local trade points in bundles. The final owner bought as many blanks as needed / wanted and handled them as he could or saw fit. In a trading context this makes total sense : less weight to carry to market, less choices to offer. I'm sure, in paralell to this, there were fully finished knives available. In a higher price range, of course. Wood / bone / horn were current handles in England / Europe. The "shambuck" ? that's intriguing... Could be a sort of leather handle.
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That’s my findings as well. I’ve read that since the colonies, Trade Knives were shipped in a hogshead barrel, blade only, no edge, for trade with the Indians & settler’s etc
 
Lesknife said:
I think the Hudson Bay knives didn’t get as much press because it’s hard to get a story out of mundane chores and regular life activities. Where as the Bowie became known and associated with fightin! A bloody knife fight sounds a lot more interesting than doing mundane chores. Just my humble observation and opinion.
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I think you nailed it.

Bowie knives became tacticool the moment the sandbar knife happened, and everyone wanted one, and nobody cared what the original looked like (or knew).

If Rambo carried a 4 inch drop point hunter no one would have bought a Rambo knife.

Same thing, basically. Bowie knives were sexy, Hudson Bay knives were not.
 
herisson said:
I easily see the mountainmen preferring their Green River butcher knives and their hatchet to the Hudson Bay knife. As with all "jack of all trades" it's a bit mediocre at everything. I didn't like mine : too heavy, not a great slicer, not a great chopper and not a great splitter.
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Funny part is that turn of the century (late 1800s early 1900's) recreational outdoorsmen, who would have been better served by a "not a great" Hudsons Bay, still had the hots for Bowies and smaller versions were sold to them like crazy. They were too thick to slice and too small to chop....making them useless. But they looked cool.
 
I can concur. Sexy is important for a knife. At least in my book. It is also possible that the Hudson Bay knife failed to seduce its target market : practical people with no fantasies, real world and vital tasks to do. The "two in one" (or 3, 4, 5 in one) stuff, you know, seldom works out.
 
marcinek said:
Funny part is that turn of the century (late 1800s early 1900's) recreational outdoorsmen, who would have been better served by a "not a great" Hudsons Bay, still had the hots for Bowies and smaller versions were sold to them like crazy. They were too thick to slice and too small to chop....making them useless. But they looked cool.
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If memory serves, that was the incentive to Nessmuk's three folded outdoor kit (double bit axe, skinner, stockman pocket folder).
 
herisson said:
I can concur. Sexy is important for a knife. At least in my book. It is also possible that the Hudson Bay knife failed to seduce its target market : practical people with no fantasies, real world and vital tasks to do. The "two in one" (or 3, 4, 5 in one) stuff, you know, seldom works out.
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Yup. Not sexy. But it is the precursor to camp knives and choppers (like the big BKs and ESEEs etc)....so its design/philosophy has really proven itself over the years and remained popular. Though...as you say, it's challenging to make a great "outdoors" all-rounder.
 
herisson said:
If memory serves, that was the incentive to Nessmuk's three folded outdoor kit (double bit axe, skinner, stockman pocket folder).
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Yup. Most likely he used that because he was an person who actually did long term wilderness living. Knew that combo worked.

Recreational outdoorspeople seem to have always been driven by "sexy" first and foremost, even going back to those turn of the century folks.

Nothing wrong with that. Its recreation. It's supposed to be fun. Like the "car campers" nowadays bashing the bejeebers out of innocent trees with big ol choppers within 50 yards of their car trunk full of beer.
 
Rhinoknives1 said:
That’s my findings as well. I’ve read that since the colonies, Trade Knives were shipped in a hogshead barrel, blade only, no edge, for trade with the Indians & settler’s etc
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Can anyone point me to a factual reference to knives being shipped to the frontier with no handles and unsharpened? I have the Museum of the Fur Trades' latest volume of their encyclopedia of the fur trade dealing with tools and utensils. There are plenty of references to finished knives being shipped in barrels but nothing about blade blanks.
 
You know, this looks almost like a Bowie (at least it's not the "wide like a paddle" version offered by Condor) :
a8e5ysI.jpg

It has enough sexiness for my taste but... 1/4" stock for 8" blade ! Ouch, I will pass.
 
herisson said:
I would say it's a golden age for knife makers !
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Better steel certainly has made it that. And for users. A quality chopper with a big blade that could hold an edge and slice was an impossibility until pretty recently.

Even Loveless's Camp Knife is a 6 inch slicer. One famous maker really started doing them....can't remember which one...gotta look it up.
 
herisson said:
You know, this looks almost like a Bowie (at least it's not the "wide like a paddle" version offered by Condor) :
a8e5ysI.jpg

It has enough sexiness for my taste but... 1/4" stock. I will pass !
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It does. They are "cousins," I guess. Beefed up French/German chef's knives. I mean...think about it...that knife would be darn handy in the kitchen!
 
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