Stoic Patriot’s Knives Had Sober Inscriptions.

With 200 years under its belt, the U.S.A. was in the spirit of celebration in 1976. And the nation’s bicentennial not only brought out the best in citizens, but knifemakers as well.

BLADE® Magazine Cutlery Hall of Fame® member Jimmy Lile was one of them, offering up a set of knives for America’s 200th birthday in the July/August issue of that year’s American Blade. Unlike other custom makers advertising flashy commemorative pieces, “The Arkansas Knifemaker” took a more stoic and serious approach to his collection.

The bowie and dagger composing the set were sober in design and ornamentation, with clean lines the defining feature of the coffin-handle knives. Yet, what the pair lacked in stars and stripes celebration, they more than made up for in Lile’s deadly serious and patriotic scrimshaw on the handle scales. One might even cast the inscriptions as stark warnings.

On the bowie it reads: “When government has taken everything from the individual, he is no longer within its power, he is free again.” While the dagger is inscribed with, “In democracy, you cannot give to the people that which you first do not take from them.”

Interestingly, these do not appear direct quotes but paraphrases by Lile. The first most closely resembles a passage from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s novel The First Circle. The second bears a striking resemblance to a line from an essay by French economist and philosopher Frédéric Bastiat.

No matter the words’ origins, they stand as portents as sharp as the knives they were inscribed on. And they’re as relevant 250 years after our country’s founding as they were at its bicentennial.

More Knife History:

• Walter “Blackie” Collins: Applying The Edge To BLADE Magazine
• American Knives: Legendary Designs From The Land Of The Free
• Antique Switchblades: World War II And Beyond