Vintage Mother Of Pearl (MOP) Knives

[Another Knife Collector]

Wow wiseguy with a beautiful pearl switch in astounding condition, then rookie with an original Tuna Valley, talk about a pair of rarities!

[dcgm4]

Beautiful knives, guys.

This 3" Miller Bros shadow bolster pen knife with pinless construction has some of the most beautiful mother of pearl/black lip pearl that I have ever seen.

Beachtree, I believe the middle section is abalone, not black lip pearl.

[Miller Bro's]

Wowee now that's a sweet one, are there any markings on it? Thanks for sharing!

Thanks It`s marked Korten Germany

[Miller Bro's]

Cant catch the fire in the picture but here`s my MOP

Nice one Schrade Cut. Co.?

[wiseguy]

Yup.... it sure is hard to capture the hypnotic charm of MOP in a picture

Cant catch the fire in the picture but here`s my MOP

Nice one Schrade Cut. Co.?

[danno50]

Interesting leg knife, Dimitri. Very nice pearl switchblade, wiseguy.
Dan

[Miller Bro's]

Thanks Dan

[cato]

DANG, THOSE ARE HARD TO FOLLOW, NICE KNIVES

PICKED UP THIS WINCHESTER NICKLE LINERS

[FRJ]

What an elegant knife, shadow and all. Certainly deserves nickel liners.
Good one, cato.

[wiseguy]

Diggin that long swedge on that Winchesters spear

[wlf]

DANG, THOSE ARE HARD TO FOLLOW, NICE KNIVES

Aint that the truth.

I love the feel of pearl in my hand. Here's the only one I think I own.

4 1/8" Clements farmers whittler( I made up that name) Clements was a high end London retailer,most likely Thomas Turner or William and Ernest Mills contract. c 1920s

[kootenay joe]

Wow ! Neat 'Farmer's Whittler. I have never seen this pattern before with a Hawkbill master blade.

[cato]

SWEET KNIFE, LUV IT

[wlf]

It appears Holley and Thomas Turner had their examples.

2nd item listed in Holley catalog, more expensive.

[Miller Bro's]

That`s an elegant knife Lyle

Here is a cheap German made knife but it has nice handles and bolsters

[danno50]

Rookie, sorry I originally missed your Tuna Valley, very nice. Great Winchester whittler, cato, I like that one a lot. Beautiful pearl on the farmer's whittler, Lyle. Another good one, Dimitri!
Dan

[Mason]

Beautiful examples cato and wlf!!!

And very unique and interesting German example M.B.
Any markings on it?

[Miller Bro's]

Just marked Solingen

[kootenay joe]

Here are 2 circa 1900 Solingen, 3" carved pearl 4 blade Senators. The pearl has fire but the overcast winter light is too weak to refract the colors.

[kootenay joe]

This is a Wharncliffe pen knife made by Joel Chamblin:

[bestgear]

Holy cow those are some beautiful MOP's, that Wharncliffe is the cat's meow, thanks for sharing them.

[bestgear]

I'm posting these here in case somebody wants to reference them in the future so they don't get lost in space.

These are from a Bruce Voyles auction in September 2014 where he sold the Estate Collection of Dr. Lawrence Emberton who is claimed to have the largest pearl whittler collection ever assembled.

Both the pictures and story are from his website.

This is a group of 28 Pearl Cattaraugus whittlers that were exhibited at the 1901 Pan American exposition. All have been cleaned and restored to as mint as possible after there was storage damage.

In 1901 Cattaraugus had the cutlery concession for the 1901 Pan American Exposition (World’s Fair) in nearby Buffalo, New York, and for the event and their booth they brought out their best. As a part of their display they handled every pattern in their line in Genuine Mother of Pearl and in smooth bone, which were displayed at the exposition. [This is also the event at which President William McKinley was assassinated which propelled Teddy Roosevelt into President.] After the exposition the knives disappeared for over 60 years, and surfaced in the late 60’s when knife collecting was just beginning. An Athens, TN collector purchased the 350 or so knives for a reported $6.00 each. On the day brought them home he told me that he stopped off at the local hardware store and let a few friends pick one out to carry.

He displayed his knives at one of the first NKCA knife shows in Louisville around 1972. When Jim Parker and Bruce Voyles started writing the first “Official Price Guide to Knives” in 1975, they took a photographer to the collector’s home where he allowed the knives to be photographed. (You can see those photos in the 1976 first edition of the Parker/Voyles “Official Price Guide to Knives.”). What is not mentioned in that book is on the day of the photography, Jim Parker offered the collector $100 per knife ($35,000) – in cash. The collector turned down the offer. This is in 1975 dollars keep in mind—an unheard of sum at the time.

Voyles returned with Parker a second time many years later in a second unsuccessful attempt to buy the knives. Over the years others pursued the knives. When the collector passed away One dealer attending the collector’s funeral was told when he asked about the knives was they had vanished. Several years later the knives resurfaced, and one large group was purchased by Tony Foster. Later the bulk of the remainder of knives was purchased by Foster and Jim Parker. Jim had finally ended up buying the long desired collection.

But there was a problem. Over the years the knives had been stored in a damp area. One source said the knives had been hidden in the crawl space underneath a house. For whatever reason the knives were rusted from poor storage. Jim and Tony paid Herbert Aycock, the best knife restorer at the time, $3000 to restore the knives as well as he could, and then the knives were pieced out.

As Dr. Emberton was the leading buyer of pearl handled whittlers, Parker pulled ALL the pearl whittlers from the exhibition knives and sold them as a group to Dr. Emberton. There are 28 whittlers in all, all having been cleaned/restored within the limits of the original damage. For reference, Parker valued the knives singly as having a price of over $18,550. He offered the entire group at a discount to Dr. Emberton at $12,984.00.

[wlf]

Beauties for sure Roland.

Thanks for sharing that BG.

[kootenay joe]

I think i have 2 or 3 of the "Emberton" pearl whittlers but will have to search for them to see if any are Cattaraugus.
BG are those your knives now ?
kj

[thegreedygulo]

NICE knives everyone!

Kootenay joe: Those are definitely some trophies you posted.

Lyle: As usual,

Cato & MRB: Great Winchester Greg & I love the pearl leg knife MRB; Who made it?

FRJ: That Southington is a beauty.

Rookie: Great Tuna Valley!

bestgear: That was an interesting read; thank you. I had read part of it somewhere before, but not all. I ended up with a few of those pearl whittlers from the Dr. Lawrence Emberton collection but they were all H. Boker's, not Catts.

Hope I didn't leave anyone out because there are a lot of pretty, old pearls posted!