There’s something about things that are slim and pointy that bespeak of sharp. Think your grandma’s hatpin, ice picks, that nasty hypodermic needle at the doctor’s office when you were a kid, etc. Lean knives can be keen, too. Here are a few. (Click on an image for a larger view.)
From CRKT:
As rugged as the mechanics who use it, this overbuilt pocket knife features a modified drop point blade that’s built from stainless steel. It’s tough enough to cut hose but still precise enough to strip wiring. Meanwhile a black corrosion resistant coating keeps the blade intact no matter what you put it through in the shop.
Editor’s note: CRKT tell us that the H is silent in “HVAS.” It’s pronounced like “vase” with a long “a.”
From CRKT:
For a minimalist with an appetite for big adventure. Jesper Voxnaes’ Scandinavian backyard is filled with fjords, punctuated by mountains, and sliced by surging rivers. So when he sets out to design an outdoor knife, it’s crafted to perform. Everywhere.
From Benchmade:
A duty knife that can be carried every day, this tactical AXIS® Assist takes its styling cues from our legacy line of automatic knives.
From Benchmade:
Subtle, yet capable, the latest version of the Bugout® was developed to be easily carried anywhere without drawing attention to itself.
Part of the Vault series. From L.T. Wright Handcrafted Knives:
It is still made with 100% American steel and handcrafted here in Ohio.
From Off Grid Tools:
With 31 features, the tool will fully equip you for any situation you might come across.
Editor’s note: In addition to a good blade, one of the best survival tools you can carry is a .22 pistol. Check out our sister site GunDigest.com for the Top list of best .22 pistol options.
Never miss a beat with a great deal on a print subscription.
Editor’s note: Few if any writers were better equipped to write about one of their peers than knife-throwing legend and BLADE Magazine Cutlery Hall-Of-Fame© member Harry K. McEvoy. Join us in celebrating BLADE®’s 45th anniversary with a recap of Harry’s story “The Saga of Skeeter Vaughan” from the April 1982 issue of The American Blade.
George E. “Skeeter” Vaughan holds the distinction of making the most fantastic knife throw in recorded history—and considering the circumstances surrounding his legendary feat, he most likely will maintain his grasp on that honor for a long time to come.
An American Cherokee Indian whose given name was “Grey Otter,” Vaughan was a member of an elite Army unit called the U.S. Moccasin Rangers, all 15 members of which were American Indians especially gifted with excellent night sight. At the age of 19 he enlisted in the U.S. Cavalry in 1942, and later landed with his unit on Omaha Beach two days after D-Day in June 1944. Two weeks later the Moccasin Rangers were formed.
On a snowy November night in 1944, Skeeter and five other members of the Moccasin Rangers were given the assignment of knocking out a German bunker with pillbox on the Siegfried Line to make way for an American advance. Belly down in the snow behind the bunker concealed on the brow of a hill in a small stand of timber about 35 yards away, Vaughan and his men were faced with the problem of how to neutralize the emplacement.
Outside the bunker was a German sentry with his back to the hill where Vaughan and his men were positioned. The sentry had to be eliminated—and eliminated silently so he could not warn the other German soldiers. There was too much open ground for one of the Rangers to cross it and silence the sentry, and a gunshot would alert the enemy.
A sergeant and commander of the patrol, Vaughan was asked by one of his men if he could take out the sentry by throwing his bayonet/knife. As a boy, Vaughan had lived on Indian reservations and was taught all about weapons by his grandfather, old Limping Bear, a Cherokee born in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. Skeeter’s training included throwing knives and tomahawks, and he had put that training to use prior to the war hurling hawks and 16-inch knives made from old bayonets in performances at rodeos and in “Doc Willetson’s Big Medicine Show” that toured the West.
However, that training was about to undergo a test like no other.
Skeeter crawled from the timber as far as he dared and stood, hoping he would not be spotted. The sentry’s back was still toward him. Skeeter threw the knife with a high trajectory, aiming about three feet above the sentry’s head. The knife turned silently over and over in its long, downhill pinwheel flight. The sentry dropped without a peep face down in the snow.
Considering the distance thrown—later measured at 87 feet—it was probably the longest successful throw in battle in the annals of knife throwing.
Later in life, Skeeter found acting roles in Happy Days, Gunsmoke, The Six Million Dollar Man, Magnum, P.I. and Revolution, per IMDB. He died in 1989.
To get a better feel for what happened on that snowy day in 1944, here’s a re-enactment. Remember that Skeeter only had one chance to get it right.
A rare Roman cavalry short sword made before the time of Christ that has been preserved in its entirety and still cuts is one of several recent highlights of the Celtic Collection Program in Milner, Georgia.
The ancient short sword is from the La Tène III (circa 2nd to the 1st century B.C.) timeline. It was in the H. Liebert private collection, Cologne, Germany, and was acquired during the 1960s and ’70s.
The iron sword is completely intact and is 20.5 inches long. Over time it has become permanently attached to its iron scabbard, and the buckle remains from where it once hung from a belt. Its thin hilt, which terminates in a small pommel, would have once been encased in wood.
According to a spokesperson, the sword has a double-edged blade still sharp enough to cut.
Though the ancient sword is believed to be from Gaul (modern France), Peter Connolly reports comparable swords in his book, Greece and Rome at War.
Similar swords reportedly have been recovered from Switzerland, France, the Thames in London, and Embleton, England.
The sword belonged to either a male or female warrior specializing in close combat tactics, a spokesperson stated.
BLADE gathered 14 years of Knives annual books into a single collection. Get it here.
Dan Delavan and Phil Lobred, two long-time supporters of the knife industry, are the latest inductees into the BLADE Magazine Cutlery Hall Of Fame®.
The formal inductions will be held during the BLADE® Magazine Awards Reception the Saturday night of the BLADE Show, which will be held June 1-3 at the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta.
The Cutlery Hall Of Fame is the only such body to recognize all members of the knife community. Nominated and voted on by living Cutlery Hall Of Famers, the inductees must have a) demonstrated extraordinary service to the knife industry; b) displayed honesty, character and integrity; c) advanced the industry by the creativity and originality of their works or contributions; d) as ambassadors or outstanding contributors furthered the positive impact of the knife industry on the world at large; and e) in summary, demonstrated a worthiness to be a member of such a prestigious group.
Along with his wife Pam, Dan closed the Plaza Cutlery retail knife shop in the South Coast Plaza Shopping Resort in Costa Mesa, California in January after 44 years as one of the world’s most forward thinking of brick-and-mortar cutlery stores. Dan was in on the ground floor, helping his parents, Del and Lois, open the store in 1974.
From the outset, Plaza was a pioneer in selling knives in a mall setting and custom knives in general—the latter at Dan’s insistence and something only a handful of stores at most did at the time. Plaza was a leader in hands-on customer service; sharpening while you waited; in-store meet-the-knifemaker events; custom and factory knife exclusives; the latest factory knives, swords, kitchen knives and assorted knife accessories; and later and through to today, online knife sales, including Randall knives and customs.
The Delavans started what would become the California Custom Knife Show in the early 1980s and made it into one of the industry’s premier cutlery events, including a visit from Sylvester Stallone that helped pave the way for the Rambo knife revolution that transformed the knife culture in general. Dan and Pam sold that show and started another one that was very successful. They recently sold the latter and it will continue under new management.
Dan also helped start the National Independent Cutlery Association, a buying group for domestic cutlery shops that boasted 100 member stores at its height. NICA helped its members in their business relationships with knife manufacturers and importers, had an annual knife and knife exclusives, and otherwise aided in furthering the availability of fine cutlery to its members’ customers nationwide.
Phil may be best remembered for commissioning what is arguably the most important knife of the modern custom era: the King Tut Dagger Reproduction by fellow Hall-Of-Famer Buster Warenski.
Beginning in 1983 Phil coordinated the annual Art Knife Invitational, an intimate gathering of the world’s elite knifemakers in San Diego, who in turn offered their knives for sale to the world’s elite custom knife collectors. The show took about a 10-year hiatus but returned as a biennial event and continued to draw the elites worldwide. It continues under the direction of Phil’s daughter, Sandee.
For a time in the 1970s Phil shared his home with Hall-Of-Famer Gil Hibben. Hibben made knives in Phil’s garage, with Phil by his side. Later, with Phil in tow, Gil enjoyed an audience with a special fan of Hibben knives: Elvis Presley. Phil and Gil visited with Elvis until the wee hours, a meeting that remains the stuff of legend.
Phil’s vast knowledge of custom knives and also 19th-century dress bowies proved an invaluable source of information for many, including BLADE. Perhaps Phil’s most important contribution was his faithful patronage and support of the custom knife industry. He bought and collected the knives of many makers from the early 1970s on at a time when the industry needed such buyers/collectors desperately to survive. As a Hall-Of-Fame nominator noted, “Phil was the definition of a knife collector, always talking and promoting knives. Then he started his Art Knife Invitational and that changed the custom knife industry forever.”
The Yakuza Flipper by Charles “Chuck” Gedraitis meshes classic styling with an unusual modern handle material in a folder that reflects both the traditional and the modern. The traditional is the Japanese-style instead of an American-style tanto blade.
“The American style would have more of a straight cutting tip,” Gedraitis noted. “This one has a little curve to it.”
The modern is the circuit board scales. Gedraitis highlights the copper of the circuit board with the bronze bolsters and a copper spacer, the latter two both in an orange-peel finish. He exposed the pattern of the circuit board by grinding into it, thus revealing the copper in the different layers of the scale material.
For more information contact Chuck Gedraitis, Dept. BL4, 444 Shrewsbury St., Holden, MA 01520 508-963-1861 [email protected], gedraitisknives.com, Facebook/Instagram: @gedraitisknives gedraitisknives.
Balisongs are a Chuck Gedraitis specialty and he will show you how he designs and makes them in his special class “How To Make a Balisong” at 2 p.m. June 2 at BLADE University in the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta.
Held in conjunction with the 37th Annual BLADE Show June 1-3, also at the Cobb Galleria, BLADE U. is the most comprehensive array of classes on knives and knifemaking of any knife show. Click here for more information.
