CASE Centennial 100 year 1889-1989 set knives

[zp4ja]

No Sir Johnnie! Not part of the Centennial set. The set had a 1889-1989 stamp on the tang. No dots system for year/era.

Jerry

[johnnierotten]

Thanks for the info,Jerry. ...I figured it was.

[zp4ja]

No problem Johnnie. I can only speak to book value but looks to be worth some money. $140 book. Nice knife my friend.

jerry

[johnnierotten]

Cool... ....I hadn't actually looked it up..but I knew it was worth more than the $40 I gave for it.
I picked it up from a site called "ETSY" ...most of the knives on the site are made in China.,,but every once in awhile a good one shows up.

[zp4ja]

Hey Johnnie,

According to Steve's book, 1989' was the first year Damascus was used by Case. Probably why it is worth a few bucks in addition to being Stag. Interesting shield by the way. Again, according to Steve's book, that "shield used only from 1987' to mid 1989'", except on a few outsourced patterns.
I do like that book for the info it contains.

Regards, Jerry

[johnnierotten]

Yeah....I need one of his books...actually,I told him the next knife that I bought from him that I would send the $$ and to send me one.

[elmerPHuD]

Hello everyone!

I have a set of the 1889 - 1989 Case Centennial Kife Sets. It is not a 100 piece set, bur rather just a 12 knife set in the roll/case. They are stamped #191. Which handles are these. The blades are, what I think anyway, Damascus blades. You can kind of see that in the second one from the top on the left.

I am trying to pay some medical bills and need to sell them. What would be a fair price for these? Thanks for the info!

[ken6]

I just have the one, The 4 blade pattern.

[zp4ja]

Hello everyone!

I have a set of the 1889 - 1989 Case Centennial Kife Sets. It is not a 100 piece set, bur rather just a 12 knife set in the roll/case. They are stamped #191. Which handles are these. The blades are, what I think anyway, Damascus blades. You can kind of see that in the second one from the top on the left.

I am trying to pay some medical bills and need to sell them. What would be a fair price for these? Thanks for the info!

Hello Elmer and Welcome!

Sorry to hear of your current hardship.

Loks like what you have there is a "CASE 1989' Rogers Bone Damascus Mint Set". 12 knives total. only 500 sets made. came with the knife roll. My books don't tell me exactly what knives came in the set but does say 12 total and those do look like the CASE 1989' Rogers Bone to me.

You can verify this by looking at the back of the 4th knife down on the left. Open the blade and look at the BACK tang (base of the blade), you should see 'ROG6025-1/2 D' stamped there. 3rd knife from top right, proabably says 'ROG6120 D'. 4th knife from top right, "ROG62131 D'. Bottom left knife should read, 'ROG61059D'. Etc, etc. You get the idea, most of the knive's (if not all) pattern numbers will start with "ROG" and most should end with a "D".

A few other things to consider on this...

Also, 1989' was the first year that CASE made Damascus bladed knives. CASE used Damascus blades sporadically to present day but not extensively or in large quantities as far as I know. I THINK there were 12 patterns released by CASE in 1989' with Rogers Bone and Damascus. I think your set contains all 12 of those patterns available. They only made 500 sets some of which may have been broken up and sold seperately. DO NOT BREAK the set unless you absolutely have to to put food on the table. CASE only made 2 other Damascus sets in 1989' as far as I know, one with stag handles, one with Trapper patterns and different handle colors.

All that said, point being, in MY opinion you have a nice scarce set of knives.

If I am correct and the set is what I think it is, book value is 1500 dollars. Not likely someone will pay that though due to sheer cost (not a 50 dollar purchase) and the economy. Depends on how bad you nedd to sell them. If you can take your time, you might get a 1000 dollars or slighty more out of it. A fair price in my opinion. Again, not a boatload of people have that amount of cash free right now so it may take time. If you need to move it fast, you may get 5 or 6 hundred. Other members may have different opinions.

I can say one thing, if it were my set, at present day and time...

If I personally could not sell it for 1000 bucks today after trying hard to sell it and died tomorrow, I'd leave instructions to my wife to put the set in with me before they closed the lid! Just the way I am.

Hope this helps. Let me know how it shakes out. Good luck.

Regrads, Jerry

[elmerPHuD]

Jerry,

Thank you very, very much! This is very detailed and helpful. The stamps on the tangs are as you say. Thanks so much!

Todd

[zp4ja]

Glad to help Todd!

Let me know how it works out.

Live well and Regards, Jerry

[jsaly1984]

Hey all, new to the site and dont mean to jump into your conversation but im e got a couple questions...i have 80 knives in my collection of centennial knives. I love to know what kind of price am i looking at, as far as set value. All 80 have the same serial number and are all redbone and serial number 071. Any info or thoughts would be great. Thanks!

[zp4ja]

Hey all, new to the site and dont mean to jump into your conversation but im e got a couple questions...i have 80 knives in my collection of centennial knives. I love to know what kind of price am i looking at, as far as set value. All 80 have the same serial number and are all redbone and serial number 071. Any info or thoughts would be great. Thanks!

Hello jsaly1984 and welcome to the forum.

You are not jumping in. Glad you did! No offense intended but I personally don't consider 80 of 100 knives of a "set" without original knife roll and all knives in set that as a "set". The chances of finding the other 20 knives in the set are astronomical I would venture to say. The book price on entire set and roll is $5000 book price as I recall. In reality much less I assume but most sets have been likely broken up and sold individually. Even one missing knife, any knife use or sharpening, missing roll degrades that DRASTICALLY.

That said, with only 500 serialized sets, 80 of the same serial number may be attractive to a buyer. Not sure about the knives you have but the 20 or 30 knives of this set I have (of the same serial number) all have awful snap and blade action. May be just the knives I have but I don't know but since the majority of the portion of the set I own is that way, I assume other sets may be the same victim to total lack of QC and pride in craftsmanship. Bad snap is a downer to many, many buyers although some may not care.

Not sure as to value based on what I stated but maybe someone else will chime in.

Again, welcome to the forum.

Regards, Jerry

[Mumbleypeg]

It's difficult to sell "sets" simply because not that many folks have that kind of cash to shell out for them. Getting value for sets requires patience - you have to wait to find a buyer interested in the particular set and who has the cash to purchase it. That's the main reason you see so few of them, most having been broken up and sold piecemeal. That and the fact you don't have a complete set would make selling them individually your best bet, I'm sorry to say.

I'd guess an average of $50 each, more or less depending on pattern. An eBay advanced search for completed sales of "Centenial" Case knives would be a good data source.

Welcome to AAPK.

Ken

[knivesrus]

The breakdown of the 3 handle materials in the numbered sets is: 24 Stag handle patterns, 16 Goldstone handle patterns & 57 Red Bone handle patterns for a total of 97 knives with the additional 3 being metal handles to make a total of 100. I don't have an individual list of the different patterns for the 3 different handle materials but I sure wish I did. If anyone can help me out with a list it would be greatly appreciated! Sincerely Yours, Knivesrus

[Mumbleypeg]

They are all listed individually, with detailed descriptions of each knife, on knifedb.com. You can find them under “sets”. Then confine the search criteria to mint sets with text of “Centennial”. As you said there are 100 knives, plus the portfolio folder. It says 500 mint sets were sold. Unfortunately I couldn’t find just a simple copy-and-paste list, and there is too much detail there (14 pages) to try to reproduce it here. I think you have to be a paying subscriber ($30 annually) to get access to it.

Other possibilities are Parker’s Guide to Values, Volume 7 (I don’t have it) and the 1989 Case Centennial catalog. I have one somewhere but couldn’t find it.

Sorry to not be able to help more but maybe that gives you some leads.

Ken