Picked up an unusual, old easy opener--thoughts?

[morglan]

I saw this one up for auction, and since it combined my three favorite aspects of traditional folders (brand, pattern and handle material), I had to have it.

It seems to be a 4 line Camillus easy opener with a bail, with natural bone scales. Before I get to my concerns and observations, here are pics:









I showed it with another Camillus EO for reference in the first few pics. It appears to be just slightly smaller in both length and width, and the front bolsters are fluted.

The master blade has lost some metal due to sharpening, but the stamp seems to be good. The front bolster has been peened and polished at some point, but I can't tell if the knife has been apart.

The scales are what throw me. As much as they initially attracted me to the knife, they are also the one thing that makes me wonder if it's a 'correct' knife. The fit of the scales isn't perfect, but I don't know what acceptable tolerances may have been, and I don't know whether the scales would've/could've shrunk.

The shield seems to be glued, and has the slightest hint of a wobble. There is decent snap to both blades, they are pretty much centered, do not wobble.

What do you guys think? How much of this knife (beyond the blades) is Camillus?

[tjmurphy]

What about the brass liners. I have a 4-line Camillus and it too has steel liners. If the shield has a wobble, I would guess that it is probably pinned.

[morglan]

I have read that Camillus switched from brass to steel liners during WWII, and then back to brass liners once the war was over, which makes sense. You can see the switch in different versions of the TL-29 as well.

[tjmurphy]

OK. I found a knife with the 4-line stamp and brass liners. I stand corrected. Since the stamp is 1941-46, then it is a 1946 knife, probably??

[orvet]

When I talked to Tom Williams about Camillus tang stamps he said they stopped using the 4-line stamp in 1945 or 1946.

He said; “Prior to World War II most stamps were four-line stamps: CAMILLUS/CUTLERY CO./CAMILLUS N.Y./U.S.A. After WWII the word ‘CUTLERY’ was dropped from Camillus tang stamps.”

From the information I got from Tom, it could be a pre-war knife.
I know they used a lot of leftover parts after the war, so I would think that would include the steel liners. IMHO, the brass liners on that knife make it more likely that it is pre-war.

The shield should be pinned if it is correct to the tang stamps.
However, I am not convinced those bone handles are original to the knife.
They may have been replaced, but I can’t tell from the pics.
I am not 100% sure they are original handles, but I am not sure they aren’t.
I just have not seen that color bone on knives from that period.
It is the color that throws me off more than anything else.

[msteele6]

Maybe it's my eyesight but the handles on that knife don't appear to be smooth bone, but rather, VERY pocket worn jigged bone. Is it possible that they are so pocket worn that the color has been removed to the extent shown on that knife?

Agree with tjmurphy, if the shield has wobble it must be pinned, which is a good thing.

The knife shown for comparison isn't really a good one for comparisons with most of Camillus' production. I think that this pattern was produced for the armed forces during WWII and it was common among a number of manufacturers, a military specification, so to speak.

[orvet]

I agree the bone may be worn smooth; it is the color that bothers me.

In looking at that the pics again I found something else that bothers me; the lanyard loop.
Notice how the loop is pinned on the upper example, but the loop on the knife in question is not pinned, but is of the kind that crimps into the holes. I cannot recall this style of attachment on any Camillus knives of that period. Now that I think about it, it looks more like someone has put a lanyard loop off an Imperial (or Colonial, etc) onto this old Camillus.

There were millions of those easy open jacks made by Camillus for military use in WWII, and they were excellent knives with good blade steel. They were also made before and after the war for the civilian market. Often someone who didn’t want a lanyard loop would remove them by cutting or grinding off the pins.

It appears to me that someone has replaced the bone handles, (we have all seen them with broken bone handles), and then added the lanyard loop from an Imperial in an attempt to make a serviceable knife. No, it is not factory spec, but I think we can all agree it is a nice looking and serviceable knife.

Remember these knives were not made to collect; they were made to work and they did work quite nicely. What we may be seeing is an example of a knife repair done 40 or 50 years ago. This knife is interesting in that it shows someone a long time ago thought it was worth the effort, time and money to repair. It says to me that someone thought highly of this knife.
And that my friends is part of the history of this knife and a good example of what I find intriguing about collect old less-than-prefect knives!

Dale

[msteele6]

Orvet,

My question is: If the bone is worn down would the layer with the dye in it be worn off to such an extent that the underlying bone (which might not have received the dye) was exposed, leaving the original bone color?

[tjmurphy]

Hey Dale - Here is a 4-line Camillus Standard Scout with the brass linings. It also has the same bale as knife in question.

[morglan]

Orvet,

My question is: If the bone is worn down would the layer with the dye in it be worn off to such an extent that the underlying bone (which might not have received the dye) was exposed, leaving the original bone color?

I think you may be on to something. If you look in the second picture down, directly above where the bail enters the knife, there's a dark spot. In person, this spot is exactly the color of the dye on the other knife. (I will try to get a good pic of that spot posted when I get home later.)

The whole knife appears to have been buffed, so I think its possible that the jigging could have actually been smoothed down on purpose.

What I'm not sure of, is whether the shield was removed to do it, as it is also buffed, but still sits flush with the scale. I will also look to see if I can tell (from the inside) if the shield is pinned.

I must admit that I'm disappointed that it didn't come from the factory this way, but that simply changes it from a collector/display piece to a carry piece.

[Miller Bro's]

The handles look replaced to me, also the bail is from a kamp-king utility knife, Camillus did not use this style bail during the period this knife was supposedly made.

[tjmurphy]

The handles look replaced to me, also the bail is from a kamp-king utility knife, Camillus did not use this style bail during the period this knife was supposedly made.

Hey Dimitri - What about the 4-line Camillus Standard Scout that I posted above with "Kamp-King" style bail? When Orvet made mention that that bail was never used on any Camillus Scout from that period I went searching a little on the bay and came up with another Standard Scout with the same bail, so, I believe that the bail is correct to the knife of that period. If I am understanding correctly, the 4-line stamp dates to 1941-46 and with the brass liners used after the WWII, I would like to conclude that both the Standard Scout and the EO are probably from 1946. Here is the one that I dug up on Ebay:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vtg-1940s-CAMIL ... 27bdaba8ea Same Standard Scout, same bail and the bail is also placed off-center. I do have to say however, that the EO in the initial post and the two Standard Scouts are the only Camillus knives that I've seen with that type of bail, all the rest are pinned. Could it be that this type of bail was only used in 1946?

[Miller Bro's]

TJ,

Look closely at your bail and the one in question, they are not the same

[tjmurphy]

True, the appearence of the two bails are different, pinched vs non-pinched, but the application is the same, Not Pinned, which is what Orvet was referring to in his statement that Camillus never used this type of bail, or lanyard loop, during this period, which is also what I thought you were saying.

[orvet]

When Orvet made mention that that bail was never used on any Camillus Scout from that period

What I actually said was:

I cannot recall this style of attachment on any Camillus knives of that period. Now that I think about it, it looks more like someone has put a lanyard loop off an Imperial (or Colonial, etc) onto this old Camillus.
Dale

I have been studying knives long enough not to make absolute statements like “never used” unless I am absolutely positive. I was making a quick response without exhaustive research, which is why I said, “I cannot recall,” instead of saying “they never used any...”

The knife on the left in this pic is an Imperial Kamp King. Note the same pinch type of lanyard loop with a flattened area above the bend. I believe that was done to make the loop appear to be pinned at a casual glance by the “average guy” buying a knife, as the pinned loops are generally flattened as well.
The other knife in the pic is a Colonial Forest Master. Note the pinch lanyard has a dimple on the flat to resemble a pinned loop. The knife TJ posted has no flattening on it at all. I think there are probably other designs of these pinch loops as well.

If I am understanding correctly, the 4-line stamp dates to 1941-46 and with the brass liners used after the WWII, I would like to conclude that both the Standard Scout and the EO are probably from 1946.

If Tom Williams is correct, (he was the Company Historian for Camillus Cutlery Co and he worked there for 30 years), the 4-line tang stamp was used well before WWII.

When I talked to Tom Williams about Camillus tang stamps he said they stopped using the 4-line stamp in 1945 or 1946.

He said; “Prior to World War II most stamps were four-line stamps: CAMILLUS/CUTLERY CO./CAMILLUS N.Y./U.S.A. After WWII the word ‘CUTLERY’ was dropped from Camillus tang stamps.”

Orvet,

My question is: If the bone is worn down would the layer with the dye in it be worn off to such an extent that the underlying bone (which might not have received the dye) was exposed, leaving the original bone color?

I suppose anything is possible, but I have to ask, “How likely is it?”
How likely is it that a pair of bone handles, probably Rogers Bone, (Rogers was the company who supplied most of the companies with bone of this style in that time period), would not absorb the dye properly and then the dyed layer would wear off?

To determine the likelihood of that happening I would look at other examples from that era. I have a bunch of knives dating to around the time of WWII with Rogers bone handles. Some are in good condition and some have been worn down (and worn out) from use and being carried daily in a pocket, but none of the examples I have look like the color of the bone on that knife.

I would ask Dimitri if he has seen any Rogers Bone wear down to that texture and color?
I know Dimitri probably has a few hundred knives from this era with Rogers Bone as opposed to my 2-3 dozen.


Here is one of the pics posted by morglan that I have noted differences between the two knives side by side.

Oh, one last observation on the shield, the inletting around the shield is considerably larger than the shield itself, especially at the top, and the bottom edge of the shield is roughed up. To me it appears that the shield was not installed in the factory. Yes, I have seen sloppy shield installations from various factories, but not that sloppy from Camillus in that time period.


When I add all of these little things up:
Ø Smooth bone as opposed to jigged
Ø Wrong color
Ø Sloppy install on the shield
Ø Wrong type of lanyard loop
Ø Rounding off from the rear bolster down into the easy open cut out. (All the sharp lines are gone)
Ø The grooved front bolster
Ø The rounding off of the front bolsters
Ø Cracks at the rear pins and at the lanyard hole on both sides as if the pins were peened too hard

When I set back and analyze this knife (or nit-nick if you will) I see far too many things wrong with this knife to think it left the factory anywhere near to the condition we find it in here. Obviously some things could be attributed to wear and use, but there are too many things wrong with the knife for me to buy or sell it as a factory knife that is just worn.


This is an interesting discussion and comparison of the two similar knives. There are too many differences between these knives for me to accept that they are the same model from the same factory from the same time frame, without the one knife being heavily modified.
Perhaps you disagree, that is fine. This is what makes collecting knives and sharing them on AAPK so much fun! I think we can all agree on that!

Whatever the story behind this knife, it is a nice knife and I like it.
I wish it could talk and tell us its story.

Dale

[tjmurphy]

Wow Dale! What a great post. You are correct in that I took your statement way to literally and probably out of context, hope I'm not turning into a liberal. Anyway, I am completely in tune with your evaluation of the EO in the initial post. I'm slowly learning the difference between a collector and an accumulator. So sorry that I mis-quoted you and read things into your post that were not there. You da man, Dale. Again, sorry for the misinterpretation.

I looked at every Camillus knife on Ebay and the only ones that I found without the pinned bale were the Standard Scout that I posted, our George Washington quill knives, a fishing knife and a small advertising knife, ALL the others had pinned bales.

[msteele6]

Here's an example on eBay that illustrates the type of thing that I believe COULD happen to the handles of a knife. This example would be intermediate between a normally worn and an extremely worn knife. Note the color change between the high points and the lower points on the jigged bone handles. By the way, the same process can be seen on the comparison knife in the originally posted knife pictures. Look right near the center pin on the comparison knife, there appears to have been a slightly higher area there that was worn smooth by the hafting process and left the bone the same (+/-) color as the OP knife.

It would also be interesting to see what 65 - 75 years of wear would do to a pinned on shield as the bone wore down around it and the shield was possibly able to rotate slightly around the pin which held it on.

By the way, I am certainly not saying that this is an original Camillus knife, certainly it isn't the same as the example knife in the photos above (the grooved bolster is ample evidence of that whereas the example knife is a standard WWII model knife). I am simply speculating as to what changes hard wear over an extended period of time might do to the appearence of old jigged bone handles.

[morglan]

Wow--

Interesting developments on my knife! Glad see there are some knowlegable folks on here.

I've taken some more pics. First, here is one that shows the spot I mentioned previously, that I feel is the last remnant of the original jigging and dye:



It isn't a chip--I really think that this knife originated with jigged and dyed Rogers bone handles that were smoothed on purpose to get rid of the jigging. The whole knife overall shows a buffing.

Here are some pics of the bail:





I don't know if an original bail would have been shaped like this, but I wonder if it was 'pinched' later, giving it this shape.

Also, I had not even noticed the rounding of the area between the notch and the rear bolster until Dale had pointed it out. Upon close inspection, it appears that this rounding was also done after it left the factory (tried to get pics to support my theory, but nothing came out that lets you see what I see in person.)

Regarding the shield, I could not see evidence of a pin inside the liner. Did Camillus ever install shields on their easy opener pattern? I don't think I've seen one, but I'm still a beginner...

Please--keep the discussion going on this one--it's helping me make the leap from 'accumulator' to 'collector', and I have found that old Camillus knives happen to be my favorite by far!

[msteele6]

Of course Camilus used shields on their easy openers, just not the WWII era example you have show as a comparison for the OP knife. Part of the confusion within this thread is that the conmparison is a WWII era easy opener that was made for the armed forces whereas the OP knife clearly isn't (shield, grooved bolsters). The question seems to be if the OP knife was ever a Camillus pattern. By the way, is the secondary blade on the OP knife marked?

[morglan]

No, nothing on the secondary blade.

You're right, I probably shouldn't have use the WWII knife as a comparison, I just haven't been lucky enough to get my hands on a pre war version!

[orvet]

Wow Dale! What a great post. You are correct in that I took your statement way to literally and probably out of context, hope I'm not turning into a liberal.

Thank you Tom, I have not had such a good belly laugh in a loooooog time!
Especially first thing in the morning before the first cup of coffee!
I promised my wife I would help her can beans today......so you KNOW I needed a good laugh to start the day!
It is all good buddy!



Morglan – You pics are EXCELLENT! I wish I could get such good pics. I am still at the bottom of the learning curve. Could you post some pics of the front bolsters about the size as you posted of the rear bolsters? I am especially interested in the grooves in the bolsters & the corners of the front bolsters.

Here's an example on eBay that illustrates the type of thing that I believe COULD happen to the handles of a knife…..


….I am simply speculating as to what changes hard wear over an extended period of time might do to the appearence of old jigged bone handles.

I have some examples of worn bone handles in my collection also, but if I have not seen Rogers bone handles wear to such a light color. Much lighter than they originally were dyed; yes. As light as the knife in the example; no. I know Dimitri has an affinity for these old knives and I would like to see if he has any old knives with Rogers bone worn to as light a color as this?

Anything is theoretically possible, but if it is likely to happen, it has probably happened before and might happen again.

Well, I am off to can green beans. Wish me luck and a cool breeze!
I will get back to this ASAP, but it may be a day or two.

[morglan]

Here are some shots of the other bolster. Now that I look at it, do the flutes on this bolster look as though they were done (crudely) by hand?

[Just Plain Dave]

I don't know nothin' about nothin'.

What I see there is a knife I'd sharpen up and have no trouble putting it in my pocket with change etc.!!!

[Miller Bro's]

I know Dimitri has an affinity for these old knives and I would like to see if he has any old knives with Rogers bone worn to as light a color as this?

Here are a couple of my parts knives, I have not found any Rogers bone worn to that light of a color. The real worn ones in the bottom photos are Miller Bro`s, H&B, W.R. Case, and Robeson.

[orvet]

WHOA – That is Rogers Bone SHOCK & AWE!

I love it!