Sponsoring the Eldred World War II Museum’s Memorial Day Weekend celebration, this marks the third year KA-BAR Knives has honored veterans killed in service to our country. KA-BAR has contributed 13 knives to be used as a fundraiser with 100 percent of the proceeds going to the Eldred, PA-based museum. To donate for a chance to win a knife, please visit http://eldredwwiimuseum.net/contributions.html. Secure donations can be made, though no donation is necessary for your chance to win. However, donating increases your odds of winning a knife: a $5 donation gives you three chances to win a knife and a $2 donation gives you one additional chance.
The Eldred World War II Museum will celebrate Memorial Day 2014 by offering free admission to the museum. The museum will also feature guest speaker Joseph Krygier, author of the book A Rage to Live: Surviving the Holocaust So Hitler Would Not Win and an exhibition on recent additions to the museum’s collections by museum Director Steve Appleby.
Get the lowdown on the upcoming BLADE Show with the BLADE Show preview issue of BLADE® Magazine—on newsstands now!
The BLADE Show preview issue of BLADE® Magazine is on newsstands NOW!
Set to invade Atlanta’s Cobb Galleria Centre June 6-8, the BLADE Show is the world’s largest and most important knife event. The people who move and shake the knife industry will descend on Atlanta for three days of the latest knives, sharpeners, swords and more, and the people who make, use and collect them, as well as free seminars, in-depth knife classes taught through the new BLADE University, the selection of the BLADE Magazine 2014 Knife-Of-The-Year® Awards—including the latest one voted on by knife enthusiasts everywhere, the People’s Choice Award—and a whole lot more. The latest issue of BLADE has the complete lowdown on the who’s, what’s, why’s and where’s of the BLADE Show and is a must-have for BLADE Show patrons.
•19 of the hottest factory knives that will debut at the BLADE Show;
•Learn how 12 hot custom knives made by some of the world’s leading cutlers with the latest in steels perform in extensive tests;
•See the past 40 years of the cutlery industry through the eyes of knife retailer/purveyor Dan Delavan, a person who has lived it and loved it, in “Plaza Cutlery: 40 and Still Sharp”;
•How to pick the best big chopping knife/machete and some of the latest factory examples;
•A tour of the cutlery venues of Budapest, Hungary, and the blades that made “the old country” cut;
•See how a drop-point bushcraft knife and fixed-blade skinner fare in Kim Breed’s “Spec Sheet” knife test.
There’s also knives for Father’s Day, mini-profiles of knifemakers Jason Tippy, Joey Cordova, Alain and Joris Chomilier, Gary Martindale Sr., Chuck Hawes and Max Harvey, and bunches more, all in the latest BLADE.
You will have the chance to vote online for the first-ever BLADE Magazine People’s Choice Award during the BLADE Show June 6-8.
Held at the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta, the BLADE Show is the world’s biggest and most important knife event, showcasing the latest in factory, custom, antique, military, tactical and other knives—as well as all things that cut and the people and companies who make them.
Vote online for the BLADE Magazine People’s Choice Award, the latest addition to the Knife-Of-The-Year® Awards sponsored by New Graham Knives, during the 2014 BLADE Show June 6-8. Above is the Microtech D.O.C. Kill Switch, the BLADE Magazine 2013 Most Innovative American Design. (PointSeven photo)
The BLADE Magazine Knife-Of-The-Year® Awards sponsored by New Graham Knives also will be presented at the show, and the People’s Choice Award is the latest addition to the Knife-Of-The-Year lineup.
Unlike the other 13 Knife-Of-The-Year honors—11 of which are voted on by BLADE Show booth exhibitors and the other two selected by the BLADE® Magazine staff—the People’s Choice Award will be voted on by knife enthusiasts online here at blademag.com.
Here’s how it will work. Prior to the Friday night (June 6) of the show, the BLADE Magazine staff will busy itself photographing the entries in the Knife-Of-The-Year competition, all of which will be displayed in the Knife-Of-The-Year Display area in the hall of the BLADE Show. Those photographs will be posted on this site as soon as possible after that time so you may view them and vote on your favorite. Only one vote per person, please. To vote, visit http://blademag.com/vote.
The winner will be announced at the BLADE Magazine Awards Reception the Saturday night of the show (tickets required) and posted here, along with the rest of the winners. The winner’s name also will be posted with the balance of the award winners outside the BLADE Show office in the Cobb Galleria Centre the Sunday morning of the show.
Don’t miss the June 2 deadline for the June 9 public meeting on the federal ivory ban. Jimmy Lile used pre-ban ivory on his classic Lone Wolf Gonzaullas knife he made in the late 1970s. (image courtesy of Jack Lucarelli)
If you care to express your views concerning the federal ivory ban, you are urged to participate in another public meeting—scheduled this time for June 9—by the Advisory Council to the Presidential Task Force on combating wildlife trafficking. Signup deadline to attend is June 2. If you want to submit talking points for discussion during the meeting but cannot attend, you must submit them in writing by June 2 as well. No e-mails or faxes will be accepted!
The meeting will be held from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. EDT at the U.S. General Service Administration Building, 1800 F St. NW, Room 1153, Washington, D.C 20405. For more information on deadlines, where to send your written statements, etc., visit https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2014/05/06/2014-10295/advisory-council-on-wildlife-trafficking-meeting.
According to scrimshander Sandra Brady, you may attend the meeting in person or you may participate via telephone. “At this time, we are inviting submissions of questions and information for consideration during the meeting,” she noted. “If you or anyone you know would like to have their voice heard, now is the time. You must sign up to make a statement or sign up to be present during the meeting by June 2. I believe letters would be appropriate if received no later than June 2.
“If you are a knife club member or in charge of a newsletter, please get this info out. Also, those of you who are active on forums, please pass this around there, too. We need a strong showing, lots of letters, and don’t forget to contact your congressional representatives. We do not want sales in pre-ban ivory to become a felony!”
The Advisory Council is called upon to hold such meetings as a result of Executive Order by President Obama (see http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/07/01/executive-order-combating-wildlife-trafficking). The June 9 meeting will be the third one held by the Advisory Council. According to an Advisory Council release, the meeting will be held to “discuss administrative topics and hear public comments and questions.”
Stay tuned to a special ivory site, www.elephantprotection.org, for updates and more information.
After over 30 years of operation, the National Knife Museum (NKM) is “being dissolved.” However, the old museum’s knife inventory will carry on at three separate museums, according to Lisa Sebenick, president of the National Knife Collectors Association (NKCA) and secretary of the NKM.
The only museum of its kind in the USA, the NKM had been housed on the mezzanine of Smoky Mountain Knife Works in Sevierville, Tennessee, since late 2006. The original rent for the space was all of $1 per year. “The officers, directors and staff of the National Knife Museum sincerely thank Smoky Mountain Knife Works/Kevin Pipes for giving our collection of cutlery a home these past seven years,” an NKM release stated.
The National Knife Museum is being dissolved. Its knife inventory will be relocated to three new locations. (Mike Carter image)
According to Sebenick, the museum’s knife inventory will be donated to three different museums: the National Rifle Association Museum in Springfield, Missouri, the Berman Museum of World History in Anniston, Alabama, and the Janney Furnace Museum in Ohatchee, Alabama.
As for the 50 or so Bill Moran knives that were exhibited at the NKM, an official statement from the Moran Foundation was that no decision had been made for those knives at press time. At some future date, perhaps some of the Moran knives would be put on loan elsewhere, the statement concluded.
According to Pete Cohan in BLADE’s Guide to Knives & Their Values, 7th Edition, while many NKCA members were heavily involved in the original museum’s creation, it was the donation of three major individual knife collections—those of Cutlery Hall-Of-Famer Frank Forsyth, Dr. James Wilkison and Dr. William Rosenthal—that created the foundation for a comprehensive museum display collection.
During its run at Smoky and in addition to the many other knives it exhibited, the NKM also included the custom knife collection of Cutlery Hall-Of-Famer Joe Drouin, a number of club knives from knife clubs around the country, various knife ephemera and more.
For the latest knives, knife news, trends and more, stay tuned to blademag.com.
The BLADE Show‘s new exhibitor layout is designed to improve the overall show experience for the thousands of patrons who will attend and the close to 750 exhibitors who will display the industry’s finest knives and knife accessories.
The new BLADE Show exhibitor layout is designed to improve the overall show experience. (PointSeven image)
The world’s largest knife show is set for June 6-8 at the Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta.
In the past, the rows of exhibitor tables were dissected by lines of factory booths in some areas, making it somewhat difficult to pick up where you left off from the previous table row. It also presented a somewhat choppy look to the overall setup.
When you walk into the show hall this coming June, a new layout will greet you. Instead of being dissected in some areas by lines of factory booths, the exhibitor tables will be in the right-hand portion of the show hall and most of the factory booths will be in the left-hand portion. There will be no lines of factory booths dissecting the rows of tables. As in the past, there also will be factory booths along the walls of the entire hall. According to one exhibitor, the change should make it so show patrons are not so overwhelmed by the visual challenge of negotiating the large number of exhibitor tables and booths.
As a consequence of the changes, the booths have been renumbered from last year.
Looking from right to left, exhibitors’ tables will be divided in the usual fashion: Antique, American Bladesmith Society, the Knifemakers’ Guild and Handmade. The collector displays will continue to be in the right-hand back portion of the show hall. The Stage and Demo Areas will be in the back center of the hall. The Knife-Of-The-Year® Display will be in the middle of the floor starting where the booths are.
For the latest knives, knife news, trends and more, stay tuned to blademag.com.
Learn how to make a cut ‘n shoot “pirate pistol,” what effect the federal ivory ban has on your knives, all about the BLADE Show’s groundbreaking new BLADE University and much more in the latest issue of BLADE®, on many newsstands today.
New, pirate-pistol-packin’ BLADE® hits many newsstands TODAY!
Steve Culver won “Best Of The Rest” in the 2013 BLADE Show custom knife judging competition with his “Laffite’s Revenge” cut ‘n shoot, and he takes you through the building of his award-winning knife pistol in this month’s issue.
On the ivory knife front, the federal government is targeting any and all items made of elephant ivory, including the very same knives that have been legal to sell for decades! Find out what the new regulations mean for you and your knives on page 10.
BLADE University is a brand new approach to knife show seminars. In fact, instead of seminars, BLADE University is a curriculum of classes, each concentrating on specific subjects and including some of the world’s best-known knife professionals as teachers, including knifemakers Jerry Fisk, Chris Reeve, Jerry Busse, Tony Bose and Bill Harsey, to name a few.
A chief concern among many in the knife industry is there are far too few young people making knives. In “Kids Just Want To Make Knives,” three young aspiring makers show off the knives they’ve made and tell how they make them, and also explain the support system of family and friends that has sustained their knifemaking endeavor.
Other stories in the new BLADE include: the heartwarming tale of how many in the knife community came together to help damascus maker Zoe Crist and family after he suffered a debilitating shop accident; the end of an era is saluted with a story on the closing of Aldo and Edda Lorenzi’s famous retail knife store in Milan, Italy; and much more, all in the new BLADE.
The Eldred World War II Museum will celebrate Memorial Day 2014 by offering free admission to the museum. The museum will also feature guest speaker Joseph Krygier, author of the book A Rage to Live: Surviving the Holocaust So Hitler Would Not Win and an exhibition on recent additions to the museum’s collections by museum Director Steve Appleby.
