All About Pocket Knives

Couple of Schrade "Sausage knives/Melon testers" TOP: 4-1/2" swell center, 2-blade, reverse tang stamped: "SS700" STAINLESS STEEL, Mother of pearl celluloid. BOTTOM: 5-7/8" J.O'.

Nice, I have one too. Seems they were often used for advertising. According to my search of catalogs, these were made from 1958 to 1970.

Jeff, I have not looked at the period 1946-1958, but I know they were making them in the Schrade CutCo years. I would have to look in those catalogs for when they were first listed. There are jillions of those things out there and some of them are pretty nice. I have been looking for one with the pocket clip, preferably free to cheap.

I believe they were making testers almost the entire time the were open. I have Cut Co testers even though they never made it into the catalogs. I do see that the catalog entries start in 1958 but I also have a tester with the NY stamp (no USA) which is earlier than '58 plus you can find the patterns listed on the price sheets starting with the earliest one available - 1950. They continued making them to the end - you can find them in every catalog up to 2004. There are lots of knives that were made and left out of the catalogs for whatever reason. Maybe to focus on the big sellers, maybe someone forgot to include it.

Thanks, Cal and Jason! Mine has the SS700 stamped on the pile side; does that help date it?