Living and past greats highlight huge roster of inductees.
The BLADE Magazine Cutlery Hall of Fame® enjoyed its most prolific induction ceremony ever when it welcomed eight new members during BLADE Show 2025.
The total includes four living inductees—Harvey Dean, Rick Dunkerley and Daniel Winkler and Karen Shook—and four deceased ones: Stanley Fujisaka, Dr. James R. Lucie, Alfred Pendray and Jim Schmidt.
Induction speeches were provided by an array of Cutlery Hall of Famers—newly minted inductee Rick Dunkerley, Ken Onion and Steve Schwarzer; friends of three of the inductees, military veteran Kevin Holland and Josh Smith, founder of Montana Knife Co.; and Stephanie Lucie, daughter of inductee Jim Lucie.
Emotions understandably ran high, as did more than a few tears. It was a ceremony to remember.
Jim Schmidt
As wrote Dellana, one of Jim Schmidt’s stellar students that also included Barry Davis, Cutlery Hall-of-Famer Steve Schwarzer, Larry Fuegen and more, Jim was “larger than life, truly a giant among men.” Added Schwarzer, Schmidt’s inductor, “Jim was like the father of filework. All of that filework in the business came out of him.” Schmidt made the first goblin folders, a unique style his students such as Dellana, Schwarzer, Fuegen and others emulated. “He was always willing to teach,” Schwarzer said. “His generosity with his time and knowledge was legendary … He was there at the rise of modern custom knifemaking and is one of the reasons the movement has risen to the heights that it has … He brought tool-and-die work to knifemaking and was an incredible artist.”
In the 1970s, along with Jimmy Fikes and Cutlery Hall-of-Famer Don Fogg, Jim was instrumental in forming the New England Bladesmith Society and organizing the Ashokan Bladesmithing Seminar. He was one of the earliest ABS members and ABS master smiths, a member of the ABS Hall of Fame, a constant member of the Art Knife Invitational (AKI), winner of the Knifemakers’ Guild’s Red Watson Award and the Beretta Award for Outstanding Achievement, and more. He was the ultimate teacher, his profession for most of his life. An outstanding book on Schmidt is James Schmidt: The Great Master, by Mike Haskew. As the book noted, Jim “welcomed those who were earnestly interested in improving their bladesmithing and knifemaking skills into his shop … and shared with them the light of precious knowledge that he realized should be readily and freely given rather than hidden.”
Alfred Pendray
“Alfred Pendray was a legend in the forging business,” Schwarzer began. “He was the pioneer in wootz research. I worked alongside him and 99 percent of the rediscovery of that material was by Alfred Pendray. Once he got his mind set on something he wouldn’t quit; he did it scientifically and that legacy will live on for a long time. He was just good to people—he was really good to people.”
Pendray taught and influenced many bladesmiths. “I learned so much from him,” noted Charley Ochs, “not only about knives and metallurgy, but also about life and social interaction as a person.” Alfred is co-author—along with Dr. John Verhoeven, former metallurgical engineering professor at Iowa State University—of articles in eight scientific journals, four bladesmith publications and BLADE® on the nature of “genuine damascus,” or wootz steel. Pendray holds patent number 5,185,044 on a “method of making damascus blades.”
He joined the Guild in 1982 and became an ABS master smith in 1983. He spoke at the Symposium on Damascus Steel at New York University in 1984, the International Conference on Damascus Steel in Germany in 1985, and at the same conference and the Imperial College in London, England, in 1992. He won the ABS Bill Moran Knife of The Year in 1991 and was elected to the Guild board of directors in 1992. He received the ABS W.W. Scagel Award in 1998 and is a past recipient of the Guild’s Red Watson Award. He served as Guild president from 1998-2004 and is a member of the ABS Hall of Fame.
Rick Dunkerley
Rick Dunkerley made his first knife in 1983 and started forging in 1992. He founded the Montana Knifemakers Association in 1993, organizing the state’s first modern custom knife show. He became an ABS journeyman smith and hosted his first hammer-in in 1995 and became an ABS master smith in 1997. He’s taught bladesmithing internationally, in the process earning the Maestro Rating by the Italian Knifemakers Guild in 2006. In 2015 he was inducted into the AKI and later served on the AKI advisory panel. He’s served on the ABS board of directors for nine years and was just re-elected for another term.
According to Rick’s inductor/former student, Josh Smith, founder of Montana Knife Co., “What makes Rick special is his relentless desire to give back and teach … He hosted hammer-ins featuring instructors like Al Dippold, Hank Knickmeier, Rob Hudson, [Cutlery Hall-of-Famers] Wayne Goddard and Don Fogg and other greats. It was through these hammer-ins that the Montana Mafia was born. With Rick as the ringleader, this group went on to shape the landscape in bladesmithing and damascus to this day. It’s because of Rick and others in this era [including Shane Taylor, Wade Colter and more] that pattern-welded steel and the patterns to create it took giant leaps into the future … There’s no doubt the incredible makers we have today are standing on the shoulders of these giants.” Added an emotional Josh, who started learning how to forge under Rick’s tutelage at 11, “That was 33 years ago and I’ve been able to be in this community and build what I’ve built all because he let a kid into his shop. I love him for that.”
Stanley Fujisaka
Stanley Fujisaka made beautiful linerlock folders and fixed blades and was a beloved mentor to Hawaiian and other makers, including Scott Matsuoka, Les George, Cutlery Hall-Of-Famer Ken Onion and many more. Fujisaka played a key role in encouraging Onion to patent his SpeedSafe assisted-opening mechanism, a mechanism that resurrected Kershaw and revolutionized folding knives. However, in his speech inducting Stanley, Onion said it was the “little” things that set the new inductee apart.
“Stan didn’t invent a new category of knives, he didn’t have some crazy invention. What he had was admiration and respect and love for every one of you guys in this room,” Ken noted. “Every time I went to a show I’d come back to his shop and he’d tell me these stories of Schwarzer, of Ruple, of everybody, and they were legends to me, and he was a really great orator about that, a really great story teller, which is really why I got enough courage to come to a [knife] show. You guys were all magical to him.
Stan was one of those guys if you bought a knife from him he would write down your name, your wife’s name, your kid’s name, where you lived, your address, everything, and he would send you coffee, Hawaiian candies, a handwritten card thanking you. He would struggle to look through his book if he saw you walking toward his table so he wouldn’t forget your name. He was the truest form of gentleman, and I think that’s more of what I learned from him. It was not just knifemaking, it was how to … respect everybody, how to conduct myself in an honorable way, and nobody did that better than Stan.”
Dr. James R. Lucie
Dr. James R. “Jim” Lucie was the personal physician of Cutlery Hall-of-Famer William Scagel and signed Scagel’s death certificate in 1963. In her speech inducting her father, Stephanie Lucie said Jim researched Scagel’s life and collected his work for over 30 years, culminating in Dr. Lucie’s seminal book, Scagel Handmade. After retiring from medicine at 65, Jim dedicated his life to making Scagel reproductions. “He recreated Bill’s designs as closely as possible—unless he saw a way to improve them,” Stephanie said. “Ever the physician, he even X-rayed Bill’s knives so he could ‘see what the old boy was up to,’ as he liked to say … His goal was to become an ABS journeyman smith, which he achieved at the age of 71.”
A highlight of his career was making a knife for Willie Nelson and presenting it to him after a concert. It was featured on the cover of BLADE®. In 2001, the ABS created the Dr. Jim Lucie Award, making Jim its first recipient. He hosted a hammer-in at his house that over 500 people attended, and he freely shared Scagel’s techniques at many bladesmithing events. “He helped many beginning knifemakers, just as others had helped him,” Stephanie said. “When it came time to move from Michigan to Texas, instead of selling his knifemaking equipment, he donated much of it to the ABS—enough for each U.S. ABS school.”
In a speech Jim said, “Nowhere does there exist a finer or more helpful cadre of people than the knifemakers and bladesmiths of today. I have not yet found anyone [among them] who was not ready and willing to help impart knowledge or answer questions. I have always believed that we must give something to the society from which we took, and these people are doing it in grand style.”
Daniel Winkler And Karen Shook
In the late 1980s, Daniel Winkler started handforging period-correct frontier knives and Karen Shook made period-correct sheaths to match. In 1992 the showcasing of Daniel’s period pieces in the hit movie Last of the Mohicans made the pair custom knife stars. The film captured the attention of Kevin Holland, who would go on to serve in both the Naval Special Warfare Development Group/aka SEALs and Army Special Missions Unit. He asked Winkler to make a hatchet for him in 1993, and Daniel complied with a model Kevin carried for the balance of his Navy hitch.
After his discharge and still with hatchet, Kevin was working as a North Carolina game warden when 9/11 happened. He joined the National Guard and worked his way into the Army Special Missions Unit. One day his team leader espied the Winkler hatchet on Kevin’s belt and asked if he could get more. Kevin contacted Daniel, who subsequently filled an order for 15 or so. Then Kevin’s old SEAL unit saw the hatchets and Daniel made them some, too. It wasn’t long before Daniel and Karen had reached a crossroads—make period pieces for collectors, or hatchets and knives for special ops warriors. They eventually agreed that making tools for our nation’s warriors was far more important than anything else they could do.
As Kevin noted in his speech inducting the new Hall-of-Famers, “… they had a higher call … making tools that meant life or death to men in combat. They saw how important that was. They put these tools in the hands of our military and law enforcement, who carry them all over the world now.” Added Daniel, “We’ve been very fortunate to be a part of it, and I couldn’t have done it without Karen.”
Harvey Dean
As inductor Rick Dunkerley outlined, Harvey Dean made his first knife in 1979—the same year Harvey and Deborah were married. “Harvey said this is the kind of wife I have. She let me sand that first knife on the kitchen table. Harvey has a good backup system there,” Rick smiled. Harvey started making knives full time in 1992 and became the 42nd ABS master smith the same year. He joined the ABS board of directors in 2004, was voted into the AKI in 2007 and served as chairman of the ABS from 2015 to 2019, and continues to serve on the board today. He was inducted into the ABS Hall of Fame in 2016.
Harvey’s taught an impressive number of students all over the USA, including conducting two hammer-ins a year with Johnny Stout for 25 years. “The amount of teaching going on there was pretty incredible,” Rick observed. “Harvey’s won countless awards. If it has to do with a bowie knife, Harvey won it … Harvey does it all. He brings bowie knives to the AKI, he brings slip joints, he’s the consummate knifemaker. He can make whatever he wants and makes it at the highest level. There just aren’t a lot of makers who can do that. And as much as he’s given back, he’s a better man, a better family man, a better father, a better husband than he is a knifemaker.”
In accepting, Harvey said, “In the Bible, Book of Romans, the Apostle Paul says a man should not think more highly of himself than he should, and I’ve tried to live my life and career like that, so it’s hard for me to get it in my head that I deserve this—but I’ll take it.”
