Is This Jim Bowie’s Brother’s Knife?

A few times a year, a knife with a supposed James Bowie connection pops up, usually leading historians to raise a collective eyebrow. It’s the Elvis, or sasquatch, sighting of the knife world.

The latest entry can be found in Waco, Texas, where a bowie knife donated to the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum bears the inscription, “R.P. Bowie to Capt. Wm. Y. Lacey,” per the Waco Tribune.

The “R.P.” could be the initials of Rezin Pleasant Bowie, older brother to James Bowie, who gave knives as gifts.

Here are pics the Waco Tribune posted to Twitter:

A significant artifact of early Texas now resides in #Waco — courtesy of James Bowie’s big brother. #bowieknife https://t.co/d2WhWLDV1k

— Waco Tribune-Herald (@wacotrib) January 11, 2018

It wouldn’t be unusual to find a forged Bowie knife inscription, but William Lacy seems like an unlikely choice. https://t.co/d2WhWLDV1k pic.twitter.com/8lzj24hSse

— Waco Tribune-Herald (@wacotrib) January 18, 2018

From the article:

Johnson said it would not be unusual to find a forged inscription on a Bowie knife, but it seems unlikely that a forger would have chosen William Lacy as the recipient.

“There’s only about half a dozen historians who have heard of William Lacy,” he said.

That the knife’s previous owner didn’t seek money from the museum is no indication of authenticity. Neither is the circumstantial evidence supporting its origins. The truth could split either way. 

By default, BLADE takes a skeptical view with these sorts of claims, and this case is no different. 

Read the full article here.

Mississippi Moves to Relax Knife Restrictions

Knife Rights reports that it’s working alongside legislators to move HB 924 forward in Mississippi. The bill, introduced by Rep. Gary Staples, would strike bowies, dirks, butcher knives and switchblades from statutes governing deadly weapons.

As an aside, it’s surprising that butcher knives would be restricted in, of all places, Mississippi. 

Concealed Carry of Fixed Blades Proposed in Washington State

It’s not currently legal to carry a concealed blade longer than six inches in the state of Washington, but the could change. If signed into law, HB 2600 would decriminalize just that. Here’s more from Knife Rights.

This Knifemaker Learned from Autopsies

It doesn’t take much to imagine where Dr. Stephen Pustilnik, of Houston, developed an appreciation for knives. He performs autopsies for a living. It’s only natural that he’d try his hand at knifemaking, too.

From the Texarcana Gazette:

He is now working his way through a year-and-a-half-long waiting list of chefs, home cooks and pathologists willing to spend hundreds of dollars on knives that hold an edge and make clean work of anything from gnarly vegetables to sinewy flesh.

This line takes the cake:

Pustilnik, after spending years examining human bodies, speaks easily of the particular mechanics of the hands. He measures his customers’ palms and observes where the metacarpophalangeal joints—the hinges at the knuckles—rest on a knife handle.

You, too, can reach that level of expertise, if you put in enough corpse time.

Read the full article here.

Have a Tip for Knife News Wire? Submit it Here

Tell BLADE with this form.