Your First Love

Blain

Blain

Joined
May 7, 2004
Messages
152
What was your first love? Or, what was the first knife you saw that got you "into" knives? Your first "I've got to have that" knife? For me, it was Chris Reeves "Yarborough". I wasn't into knives at all at the time, and knew next to nothing about them. However, when the Chris Reeves "Yarborough" first came out in the early 2000's, it instantly caught my eye (saw it at some local store in the mall). I loved how it looked, and the fact that it was a "special forces knife" (it must be good right) made from a "modern super steel" intrigued me. However, the price tag was even more shocking to me at the time (over $300, even then) and I couldn't justify spending that much on a knife.

Obviously, I know a lot more about knives now and own a lot of quality blades. However, I still don't own the Yarborough, ironically enough. Though what it did, was pave the way for my interest into knives, caused me to research and learn more about the actual type of knife I needed. As cool as I initially thought the Yarborough was, it just wasn't something that suited my needs and I still don't own one to this day. The "battle rat" by Swamprat ended up being my first real pricey and informed knife purchase. However, it was my initial interest in that Chris Reeves knife that paved the way for me to learn about, and get into knives.

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What about you? Let's hear about your story!
 
The Rambo movies is what did it for me...owned all 4 at one time...then I saw quality and learned how to use a knife. Now it's Strider fixed blades and Busse Combat. Next is Miller Bros Blades.
 
zombieassassin said:
The Rambo movies is what did it for me...owned all 4 at one time...then I saw quality and learned how to use a knife. Now it's Strider fixed blades and Busse Combat. Next is Miller Bros Blades.
Click to expand...

Rambo is a good one, and those movies and that knife got a LOT of people into knives. Same to a lesser extent with "Crocodile Dundee". Did you ever end up buying any "Rambo" type clone knives during your infatuation before you got informed?
 
SAK for me. Had all sorts of bayonet style fixed blades and an older and wiser person told me to go buy one because I'd actually use it. Around '82.

So that SAK changed me from a person who owned knives to a person carried and used a knife.
 
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My dad bought a Gil Hibben Rambo III knife (not sure if it was UC or not, it had Gil's makers mark on it though) when I was just a little guy, after the movie came out, and I've been hooked on both since then. Yeah, they're old, they're cheesy, they're unrealistic, but how could you hate Rambo?! lol
 
At a outdoors enthusiast store, closing its doors because it was moving (actually to the town I lived in) I fell in love with a SOG Pentagon Elite, pre-arc lock. Too bad I lost that knife many years later.
 
Yep...every one of mine was a Hibben design and had his signature on them. I actually used the heck out of the Hibben III and Hibben IV. The first two with hollow handles got a little camp time use..but after trying to cut fence like John Rambo did I broke some teeth off the back. Think it got lost or something when I was a kid 20+ years ago. And yes, hating Rambo normally gets you killed. Sly Stallone is my second favorite actor after Clint Eastwood. ...lol...just kidding...Robert Dinero and Al Pacino are prob my two favorite.
 
This is the one that did it for me. Well, not this exact knife but one just like it. Buck 703. Saw one in a pawn shop in 1980 or so and had to have it. I started collecting knives right after that. Accumulated maybe 15 knives then lost them all in a house fire.

Fast forward about 26 years, I decided to see if I could find one for old time's sake. Much to my delight, they were discontinued but still easy to find in mint condition.



I now own three of them.

 
My grandfather gave me a Camillus Cub Scout knife when I was 10 and that was it for me...
I've been a knife-oholic ever since...
 
For me it was a pen knife in a bubblegum machine back in the sixties. Just had to try for one every time my parents went grocery shopping. On the way out the door, I would put my nickle in and turn that dial, lol. Those were the days.
 
Some cheap knife my dad got me when we were at the hardware store one day. Everytime he'd take me, I had to look at the knife case. After routinely pointing out the same knife, he bought it for me.

Many sticks were whittled, slips that taught me to be safer with handling. I've carried a knife damn near every day since I was about 9 or 10. Even in high school when I had my SAK on my car keys, which I clipped to a belt loop with a carabiner and let them dangle all day, never got in trouble.
 
The Rambo knives definitely did it for me. I always wanted one and came very close to purchasing the clones until I started doing more research and found out about better quality Knives but I still would drool over the Rambo knife design
 
Back when I got my first real job, and first real money...we used to go stomp around in the mall on the weekends....there was a shop called Leatherwoods, it was a leather shop that sold motorcycle type jackets and such and I used to go in there jut because I loved the smell of the leather.....

Eventually while I was browsing thru the store, I ran across a knife case...Bought a lot of great knives out of that case over the next few years... 80s model Cold Steel tanto, Sog Tech bowie, Buckmaster, several Blackjacks...Mamba, Simba, Wasp daggers...etc etc......

But my very first knife, the one that started it all was the Pacific Cutlery/Benchmade Bushmaster....ohhh holy jesus, I still have it, still love it as much as I did the first day...VERY sentimental about that knife...Lotta good memories attached to it. When me and my wife first got married, it chopped down OUR very first Christmas tree....I love that knife....

Pic stolen from the internet, I have a ton of in use shots of it from over the years, but none that are of decent quality....

 
I used to buy alot of Winchesters and Gerbers.
I was always super picky about fit and finish. Even with the cheapies.
So I figured I'd buy an expensive one to see if the fit was better.
It was a Cold Steel Mini AK-47.
Excellent fit and finish.
And then I bought a Spyderco Tenacious I found at a convention.
And then I found these forums and it was all downhill from there.
 
My intro to quality knives was the Cold Steel Counter Point II, years and years ago - back when I thought $40 for a knife was ridiculous.

Shamelessly hotlinked picture:
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Easily one of the most ergonomic handles I've held to date. Say what you will about Cold Steel's marketing, but they earned a lot of respect from me with their insanely solid construction and amazingly ergonomic handles. I have a Cold Steel Large Espada right now, and I can't find an uncomfortable way to grip it that doesn't involve putting my fingers around the blade.
 
Hawgsnawt said:
Back when I got my first real job, and first real money...we used to go stomp around in the mall on the weekends....there was a shop called Leatherwoods, it was a leather shop that sold motorcycle type jackets and such and I used to go in there jut because I loved the smell of the leather.....

Eventually while I was browsing thru the store, I ran across a knife case...Bought a lot of great knives out of that case over the next few years... 80s model Cold Steel tanto, Sog Tech bowie, Buckmaster, several Blackjacks...Mamba, Simba, Wasp daggers...etc etc......

But my very first knife, the one that started it all was the Pacific Cutlery/Benchmade Bushmaster....ohhh holy jesus, I still have it, still love it as much as I did the first day...VERY sentimental about that knife...Lotta good memories attached to it. When me and my wife first got married, it chopped down OUR very first Christmas tree....I love that knife....

Pic stolen from the internet, I have a ton of in use shots of it from over the years, but none that are of decent quality....

Click to expand...

Oh nice, a Jest bolo type design. I like it! What are the specs, and what type of steel is that?
 
OP - I have a very similar story to yours.

I have been "a knife guy" forever. As far back as I can remember, I've had a knife "collection", and my parents thought it was a worthwhile and worthy hobby. They always supported it. My Dad taught me how to play mumbledypeg and stretch, and patched up all my resultant wounds... My parents always broke me off a few bucks to buy knives at gun shows when I was little (my Dad is a huge gun and coin nut).

The first "real" knife I remember owning was a very small Gerber lockback. My uncle Gerald gave it to me when I was 6 years old. He and my father taught me how to use it. By age 8, I had a budding collection of "cool to a pre-teen knives" and it continued until I was around 14 when I got into Buck 110s, Old Timers, Case, etc. Had lots of them. All good knives. Around that time I picked up a Kissing Cranes stiletto. Used and abused the heck out of it for many years.

As soon as I moved to "the BIG city" (Amarillo, TX - from southwest Kansas) I checked out the local knife store. I instantly fell in love with a SOG Tomcat. I then went home and saved for a month until I could afford it and bought it.

A couple years after that I became truly "knife aware". We all know that point. Where you go from knife guy to knife geek, basically. The knife that did it? Emerson CQC-7. It was just so badass I had to have it. To this day I still haven't owned one, but it's what sparked my interest enough to join this site and start looking around.

Believe it or not, I lurked for 2 years before joining, just reading. It's because every time I'd look up anything on knives this site would pop up. I'd think to myself "there's a lot of good info on that site, but it looks like a downhill slope. I don't wanna get all addicted to knives like all those nerds". Seriously.

Thanks nerds. :)



Tl;dr - Emerson CQC-7
 
I was always happy with whatever blade the Snap On guy had at the time.
The beginning of this summer that little POS broke and took a chunk out of my finger at work.
Saw a BM 940 and felt like a crack head!
Now my 2 older boys have one, bought myself 2 more.....then found this nut house and realized I NEED more blades!
Up to 30 now and there is no end in sight.....I just 'found' ZT.......uh oh!!
 
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