The 2008 inductee into the Blade Magazine Cutlery Hall-Of-Fame©, Ken Onion (right) prepares to shake the hand of his inductor, fellow Cutlery Hall-Of-Famer Frank Centofante, during the induction ceremony of the Blade Magazine Awards Banquet the Saturday night of the BLADE Show.

Ken Onion, inventor of the SpeedSafe assisted-opening mechanism, one of the world’s best-known and most successful custom knifemakers, a benefactor of the Paralyzed Veterans of America and other worthy causes and more, is the 45th member of the Blade Magazine Cutlery Hall Of Fame©.

Bestowed at the Blade Magazine Awards Banquet the evening of May 31 during the 27th Annual BLADE Show, the honor was a complete surprise to Onion as he sat at one of the front tables in the Grand Ballroom of the Renaissance Waverly Hotel in Atlanta along with his friends and co-workers of Kershaw Knives.

Not only is Onion the youngest member of the Hall but his meteoric rise to cutlery acclaim in such a relatively short time as compared to his fellow Hall Of Famers—he was basically an unknown when his Random Task assisted opener for Kershaw won the Blade Magazine 1998 American-Made Knife Of The Year®—is unprecedented.

Those in the Grand Ballroom rose as one in a standing ovation upon the announcement of Onion’s induction, and many rushed to embrace the honoree and ask him to autograph their Onion-designed knives after the banquet’s conclusion.

“This is the most incredible honor I’ve ever had; I’m at a loss for words,” an emotional Onion told the gathering of knife industry professionals and others after his induction by fellow Cutlery Hall-Of-Famer Frank Centofante. “The members of the Cutlery Hall Of Fame are my heroes. This is a huge honor. To be a part of this organization is the biggest honor that anybody could give me.”

“That’s My Boy”
A good friend of the honoree’s, Centofante recounted many of the high points of Onion’s career.

“In 1989, Ken’s wife, Noel, made arrangements through a friend for Ken to meet the great custom maker in Hawaii, Stanley Fujisaka,” Centofante said in his induction speech. “Ken and Stanley became friends and Ken learned his basic knifemaking skills from Stanley.
“Recently, when I was in Solvang, California, I had dinner with Stanley. Ken’s name entered the conversation and I could see a smile come over Stanley’s face. And Stanley said, as a proud mentor would say of his student, ‘That’s my boy.’”

In 1996, Doug Flagg, then with Kershaw Knives and now vice president of sales and marketing for Columbia River Knife & Tool, went to Hawaii to call on a Kershaw account. While there he discussed a potential working arrangement with Onion for the assisted-opening mechanism. Soon after, Kershaw’s Jack Igarashi and Pete Kershaw signed Onion to a contract.

Back then, Kershaw was small with a vast majority of its knives made out of house, Centofante noted. Over the next five years the company would grow to well over 100 employees and the number of high-quality knives would skyrocket inside a manufacturing facility that became one of the most modern in the industry.

“Ken Onion’s locking mechanisms, fabulous designs and contributions in manufacturing, teaching and marketing have helped to increase product quality and led to the growth and success of Kershaw,” Centofante continued. “And the company is still expanding under the leadership of Jack Igarashi.”

Onion was instrumental in getting Kershaw to donate a portion of the profits from its Zero Tolerance knives, which the honoree helped design, to the Paralyzed Veterans of America (PVA).

“Ken wanted to give back to the people who put their lives on the line,” said Joe Fox, immediate past president of the PVA. “Kershaw stepped in and said, ‘Yeah, we’ll do that,’ and he took it to them and they said yes and contributed to the PVA’s outdoor recreation fund.” Fox was among the PVA members—the others were U.S. Army MSG Al Evans (retired) and U.S. Army SSG Hector Marquez—who participated in the presentation ceremony for the Blade Magazine 2008 Knife-Of-The-Year® Awards during the banquet.

Centofante went on to talk about Onion’s over 36 patents on various knife locking mechanisms, “fabulous knife designs” and more. Concluded the inductor:

“Most importantly, Ken is a good person. He is honest and a man of the highest integrity. He is a person who keeps his word. Talking to Ken about knives is like being on a train going 100 miles per hour and trying your best to catch the scenery going by the windows. He is so enthusiastic and has so many ideas. All I can say is if you thought the last five years were something then just wait, because the best is yet to come.”

Each year, the living members of the Blade Magazine Cutlery Hall Of Fame© nominate and then vote on the latest inductee to join their ranks. In order of induction, the members of the Hall Of Fame are:

Uncle Henry Baer; Dewey Ferguson; Bo Randall; James B. Lile; M.H. Cole; Al Buck; William R. Williamson; Pete Gerber; Bob Loveless; Bill Moran; Jim Parker; George Herron; Frank Buster; Dr. Frank Forsyth; A.G. Russell; Ken Warner; Jim Bowie; Maury Shavin; Hubert Lawell; William Scagel; Gil Hibben; Harry McEvoy; Buster Warenski; Albert M. Baer; Col. Rex Applegate; B.R. Hughes; Bruce Voyles; Bernard Levine; Houston Price; Bill Adams; Jim Weyer; Chuck Buck; Blackie Collins; Frank Centofante; Ron Lake; Sal Glesser; Joe Drouin; Bob Schrimsher; Rudy Ruana; D’Alton Holder; Michael Walker; George “Butch” Winter; Tim Leatherman; Dan Dennehy; and Ken Onion.