Pictures of some old factories and buildings...

[Bryan]

Oh boy. I feel like a kid in a candy store about what might get shown in this new forum.

If anybody has some, I'd like to see pictures of a few old factories / buildings where many of the old American knives were once made.

Thanks!
Bryan

[smiling-knife]

Hi Bryan. This is a great idea . I am fascinated by the historical facts and the lore assocaited with the hobby. Hopefully, i can contribute from my side of the pond. s-k

[Bryan]

I'm about to show my serious lack of knowledge here, but just to get this topic started; I have attached a picture of the Remington Arms Company in Bridgeport Ct. No clue about the date of this picture, but I presume some knives were manufactured in this location at some point in time???

Bryan

[Bryan]

Hi Bryan. This is a great idea . I am fascinated by the historical facts and the lore assocaited with the hobby. Hopefully, i can contribute from my side of the pond. s-k

I think it's a great idea too.

Thanks to the members who thought of it! I'm looking forward to seeing what might get brought up here. I know there are countless topics that stem from your side of the pond S-K. I guess almost all of them would trace back in some way .

Bryan

[justold52]

Will this count?
It's behind Sunburst's S&M factory

[lt632ret]

This is the original photo taken in 1903 ( dated left bottom ) of the New York Knife company Walden NY. The factory had just been sold by Col Bradley the new owners wanted a real photo since prior to this the company had always used a lithograph of the factory. Unfortunately the technological problems with a photo of this size meant that a special camera had to be brought up from NYC ( known as a coffin camera due to size) . This photo was considered a wonder for the time and often you will find old regular photgraphs taken of this old photo since it was such an oddity. The pic has the original frame made by the factory workers apparently the pic was processed in NY and sent back to Walden for framing since the frame is backed with an old crate look close and you will see a knothole and lines where the light has darkened the pic over the last 103 years. Also the tape used to seal the back is the original Hammer arm logo tape of the type used then. I found this in an auction it was one of those artifacts that one remembers seeing as a kid as soon as I heard whose estate it came from I knew where it had been all those years. If I had known I could have probably gotten it for nothing as it was upon finding it I would have paid anything to get it. Fate has a weird sense of humor. LT PS Hey I am getting better at this I added a pic of the original Litho NYK used prior to the photo.

[orvet]

Here is a picture from a copy of a 1924 Winchester-Simmons catalog.
This is in the period of time when Winchester-Simmonds owned Walden (I think), I am a bit fuzzy on the details of who owned who..............perhaps LT can bring things into focus for me.

Dale

[lt632ret]

In 1870 a group of workers from the NYK company were playing a then new game called Baseball on there lunch hour . as the story goes top floor against the second floor ( by the way this building made Ripleys as one of the few factorys in the world where you entered from the top floor since the building was built in a river gorge ). A fight broke out between the teams after lunch both supervisors from the top and second floor were called into the owners office ( Col T Bradley). He advised them that baseball did not fit the company image and that they were not to engage in it on there lunch break in the future. They informed him that they quit.
Thus began Walden knife actually the WALDEN CO-OPERATIVE KNIFE COMPANY. Knives made during this time frame are exceedingly rare. In 1874 they became Walden knife. This is a long story so I will be leaving a lot out. In 93 George Schrade started producing the first ( practical factory produced line ) of automatic knives The press button knife line a division of Walden Knife. Automatics had been around however this was really the first effective factory application. ( Geo and his brothers did not start Schrade until 1904 after Geo sold his interest in Pressbutton) in 1911 EC Simmons Hardware took over controling interest in 1922 they merged with Winchester arms making Winchester Simmons in 1923 the machinery was moved to New Haven CT. All this information can be found in Goins, Levine 4, my book The Collectors guide to Switchblade knives and various other sources. BUT this very rare original Walden COO. Knife Co Walden NY (circa 1870-74) can only be found in my collection. PS notice the rough hand stamped tang , also as a side note. from this time on NYK was known in Walden as the upper shop and Walden knife ( Now the Thruway shopping center ) which is located about a half mile down stream on the Wallkill river, below a second smaller damm, was referred to by the locals as the lower shop. hope you like the pics LT.

[Gr8Scout]

Nice contribution, LT. Here is mine, the E. C. Simmons Company.

Was any knife ever produced inside these buildings?

[relodr36]

Great pictures,guys,but a little saddening!
"Made in USA manufacturing" has almost disappeared and it's a darned shame!
Corporate greed and the "ME generations" demand for cheap goods,regardless of quality,has about eliminated the chance of enterprises like these ever happening again!
Keep em coming,as it's refreshing to read about these old firms that made excellent products and a decent profit here in the US!

Ron

[Mossdancer]

Some reprints of old ones
wb

[lt632ret]

This is a group of pics of all three knife factorys that were in Walden at around the turn of the century ( actually Schrade started in 1904 well actually 1903 but they say 1904. ) During this approximate period of time this little village produced 50 to 70 percent of all the knives being sold in the United States. it was known as the little Sheffield of America. This group of pictures in one frame used to hang in the office of one of the executives of Schrade. Yes it is sad that most knives today are imports strangly until tariffs were imposed on imports the knife industry in this country after the civil war almost collapsed but that is another long story . It is only when under the legislation introduced by William Mckinley regarding tariffs that NYK began being able to compete with foreign competition. This itself is an interesting piece of history since Mckinley was a close friend of ( owner NYK) Thomas Bradley having served together as aides de camp. Bradley got that duty by being a bonafied hero at chauncelorville, Mckinely got it because, well he was a connected upcoming politician. In any event isn't it strange that after the war Bradley started building up his company ( with a mysterious 250,000 dollar loan a lot of bucks then, to this day no one is sure where the money came from ) while all the other companies were going out of business in fact Bradley was hiring the competitions labor. All with no place to sell his knives that is until the Mckinley tariffs became law then he had the goods the labor and was holding all the aces. When Mckinley ran for president he was forced to change his stand on tariffs ( in order to get elected ) you see Americans will traditionally buy from whom ever will sell cheaper ( even if they are people who have sworn our demise and who have spilled American blood to try to change our way of life) ( look around today nothing has changed to save a buck we are selling out our own people ). Isn't it strange that right around that time frame Bradley must have had a vision ( or at least some information on the way the wind was blowing) and suddenly decided to sell NYK. Oh yes he then became a NY congressman. So if you are ever driving through Walden NY and see a statue of a man holding a flag ( whom you do not recognize ). That is William Mckinley yup Walden is about the only small village that did not opt for Washington or Lincoln or one of the better known ICONs of our history and that is the reason why. By the way the statue reads WILLIAM MCKINLEY FRIEND OF THE WORKING MAN. LT PS here is a bit of trivia Mckinley was the last president who was an officer during the civil. He mustered out a Major.

[Bryan]

This kind of stuff is priceless. It really gets the imagination going. Crap... I just realized I haven't got anything done today. I've been day dreaming about these old days.

Bryan

[smiling-knife]

Hi everyone. I recently bought a 12 page original article on Sheffield from a 1884 magazine. About 1/2 of it focuses on knife making. The author was given a guided tour of one of the big factories. It doesn't say which one though It paints quite a grim picture of the working conditions, but also provides some fascinating little tidbits of informationwhich I will share in the near future. For now here is the lytho of the works. If anyone recognises it, please let me know. Excellent thread and love the knife lore forum. Thanks. s-k

[knife-nut]

Here's a picture of Landers, Frary and Clark.

[knife-nut]

Napanoch factory around 1915.

[Gr8Scout]

Thanks eveyone. Thanks SK for your Sheffield pic. Love to read interesting tidbits that you mention.
Phil

[orvet]

Knife-nut,
Thanks for the pics.
I have a few LF&C but no Naps. High on my priority list is a Hammer Brand made by Nap, before Imperial got a hold of the name.

Dale

[galvanic1882]

Hi All, Here is an old post card showing JBF Champlin's opera house which housed the first Cattaraugus Co location in Lttle Valley NY

[lt632ret]

My personal opinion ( for what it is worth) is that one if not the best reference for Napanochs ( a knife I love ) is the Rhett Stidham book NAPANOCH a white mans knife with a "Red Man's Name . Hey what do you want from me I didn't name the book . Seriously it has numerous period factory pics and catalogue sheets. I have an address for Rhett however I believe it is out of date. he should be able to be found on the internet and he was or still may be involved with the Randall society. I believe you may still be able to get this book directly from him. The story behind the story of the creation of the book is interesting as well as are the still local familys which owned the company. This is all part of the history of the cutlery industry in the Hudson valley which is about 100 miles north of NYC and about as different as two worlds can be. I am attaching some pics to give an idea of some of the info this book contains. While this book contains some great pics aint nothing like the real thing so I included a pic of the Nap toenail or sunfish pattern. This is a fairly sought after knife and while I have a few Naps this is one of my favorites it was advertised in the catalogue as the pocket ax the idea being that you could use the heavy blade as an Ax blade that is put it on some thing and hammer on the back of the blade ( the very thought of doing this with a beautiful artifact like this makes me cringe ) Still in those days this was not an artifact but rather a working tool so they did it luckily some people did not use it this way I included a pic of mine which while pitted ( hey it is 100 years old I am not that old and pretty worn myself what can you expect ) has not been beaten on. Hope you like the pics get the book if you can originally it cost 5 bucks I do not know what it costs now it you can find it. Enjoy the pics. LT

[Mossdancer]

Thanks to all for the pics.
Here is a peek inside the box. Yeah they had technology advances then also.
wb

[lt632ret]

Dale ( ORVET) my friend no offense but the original Hammer name was a trade mark of New York Knife not Napanoch . It was acquired by Imperial after New York Knife closed. While New York Knife produced high end Hammer brand knives Imperial used the name on Shell handled knives and in general knives of lesser cost. New York knife was in Walden NY, Napanoch was in Napanoch NY ( a mile or two outside of Ellenville NY ) Imperial was in Providence Rhode Island and made there Hammers there aside from possibly an oddball special commerative issue (????) hammers were never made in Ellenville even after Schrade acquired imperial and later moved all there stuff to Ellenville. There is more but this should be confusing enough for now.

Bythe way Napanoch was acquired by Winchester and later Winchester acquired Walden knife ( which is what you may be thinking of ) Winchester also acquired what was originally Walden knife from EC Simmons who bought Walden knife from the original owners. Also Walden knife is where Keen Kutters were made as well as several other old brands well that should finish off anyone who was not confused before. I wonder does any one else care about all this history or is it simply a disease I alone seem to have acquired. LT

[Mossdancer]

To any interested person;
Some of these photos are pretty small, If you do not know how to take them into your own computer and enlarge them so you can read the fine print. Please feel free to ask.
wb

[lt632ret]

Since grinders have come up. Here is a pic of my ( now porch ) ornament . It is the original circa 1920s belt driven stone grinder used by Micheal Mirando who owned Imperial knife . This sans the plexi case was taken from Rhode Island when Schrade acquired it and moved all the stuff to Ellenville. This used to be in the lobby of the last schrade factory (in Ellenville before it closed ). I included a pic of the sign it had on it in when in the lobby. If you think it was easy stuffing this in my pocket and walking off with you are wrong. Anyway as Bobby Bare ( an old country singer ) used to say but I got her boys and that what makes me the winner. LT

[Mossdancer]

Hey LT;
When you gonna start selling tickets to visit your house, or is the museum getting closer.
wb