All About Pocket Knives

Nice one thanks for showing it

Wow, those are some unique knives!

Here's one with an odd mechanism my grandfather gave me a number of years ago. It advertises Virginia Metal Products Company, who made (and still may) make truck beds, located in Richlands, Virginia about 35-40 minutes away. My grandfather bought a number of things from them back when he was a purchasing agent for a local coal mine, and I guess this was how they reciprocated that.

There are no markings on the knife (well, other than the company name on the front). Under the blade, there's USA and a patent number (what I could make out) of 2,668,-28 (something's probably missing between the comma and the two) that looks to have been hand-engraved with an engraver. It's about three or three and a half inches long. The knife, except for the blade, is entirely plastic. The mechanism is, what looks to me, to be a cheap way for one-handed opening.


Advertising side of handle:

Blade opening mechanism side of handle:

Lift up handle on blade:

Then slide the handle (which is attached to the blade) to the front of knife:

Then after the blade is fully slid out, fold down the handle:

Cotton Belt Route "The Railroad of Courtesy"... The WEH(?) Co, Newark, NJ

Go figure...

Lawrence wrote:Cotton Belt Route "The Railroad of Courtesy"... The WEH(?) Co, Newark, NJ

Go figure...

I think if you look again you will see that it says W & H Co. which stands for Weibusch and Hilger.

Thanks K7K!...Wiebusch and Hilger it is, and Goins puts it at 1876-1928. By the looks of it, even though it's a little fella, it was carried in some very interesting, historical times. cheers

Actually, I suspect the "W&H" stands for "Whitehead & Hoag" of Newark, NJ.

I might be wrong on the spelling of "Hoag" and it might should be "Hogue".

They were distributers of all kinds of advertising items, including knives.

It was meant as a cigar cutter, but it doesn't look to me like the blade would fully traverse the opening for the cigar tip. Press down on the back of the blade and see if it does so.

Charlie Noyes

Thanks for clarifying Charlie, much appreciated. I haven't had a chance to check Goins yet, however I found the following by searching images of the company and I found one pocket knife...most other images were of old school advertising and decorative buttons:

Blades tang stamped THE W. & H. CO. / NEWARK, N.J. and THE W. & H. CO. - The Whitehead & Hoag Company, Newark, New Jersey.
Benjamin Whitehead and Chester Hoag became partners in 1892. Their company sold all types of advertising, promotional, society, union, and political items. Their specialty was printing in color on celluloid, which they did in their own large factory. They held many patents related to this process, including the original pinback badge patent.
The W. & H. Company also sold private brand products made for it by other firms, notably advertising, souvenir, commemorative, and presentation pocketknives. Most The W. & H. Co. marked knives were made by H. Boker & Co., also then of Newark NJ, later of Maplewood NJ.
The Whitehead & Hoag Company endured until 1959, but its heyday was prior to World War I.

I don't think Goins listed Whitehead & Hoag, as such, but did list it as just the initials, pretty much the way the knives are marked.

One item I 've seen often from them, that are also pocketknife related, are celluloid backed pocket knife hones, round or oval, with all sorts of advertising on them, including cutlery companies.

Charlie

Here is an old novelty knife, I don`t think they made too many of these.............

galvanic1882 wrote:Here is one I just got. Safety Pocket Knife. I had seen one that a friend brought to show last year and they are pretty cool. It is a gravity knife. You push in on the tabs in the handle and hold it blade down and the blade slides out and locks open. Works the same on both ends. Neat at 3 1/2" closed

I finally did the search for the patent and found it, link below. When I looked at the results there was a knife below patented by a man with the same last name, J Pantalek. Funny but I have a knife that opens the same way as the one he patented. To unlock the handle so the blade can be swung out you need to pull one of the bolsters apart. I have had this knife for years and always thought it was made by a machinist but never knew the design was patented. Go figure.

The patent's are the first 2 at the top of the page.

https://www.google.com/search?site=&tbm ... dxMXCFyL7M

Very cool knife Mike ... unique for sure and a mechanism I have never seen (I have handled a few gravity knives but none like this) - thanks for sharing the photos and all!!