All About Pocket Knives

The United States presidential election of 1904 was the 30th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 1904. Incumbent President and Republican candidate Theodore Roosevelt was elected to a full term. Roosevelt had succeeded to the presidency upon the assassination of William McKinley. During the election campaign, Republicans emphasized Roosevelt's success in foreign affairs and his record of firmness against monopolies. The nominee of the Democratic Party was Alton B. Parker, Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals. The Democrats argued the Roosevelt Presidency was "arbitrary" and "erratic." Parker's running mate was Hiram G. Davis, the oldest man ever to seek the office of vice president at eighty years of age.

Roosevelt easily defeated Parker, carrying every region in the nation except the Solid South. He became the first person ever to win election to a term in his own right after having ascended to the Presidency (from the Vice-Presidency) upon the death of his predecessor. This feat has since been repeated three more times - in 1924, 1948 and 1964.

Below are some campaign buttons and other memorabilia from the election of 1904.

What has all this have to do with Knife Lore?

The Parker - Davis campaign knife showing Parker's facial image on one side via a clear celluloid picture handle on one side was made by The Robeson Cutlery Company.

They did not show a Robeson tang stamp, but they identified it as such in the item description.

This knife sold in a political memorabilia auction sometime in the recent past for $76.00.

I found all this during a Google search for "Robeson Cutlery".

I do not own any of it, but I wish I had it all, but the celluloid is about to out-gas.

Too bad.

Charlie Noyes

Great stuff Charlie! Thanks for posting it. It's really sad that the knife is deteriorating like that.I wasn't aware that Robeson made picture handled knives.Got to be a rarity in it's own right.
I have always been puzzled by picture handled knives.I have some that looks as good as the day they were made close to a hundred years ago and others that were far newer that literally fell apart after a few years.
I have an Aerial Cutlery Co letter opener knife that had an ad for the Navy Pilots School prior to WWII.One handle had not only disintegrated but had taken the brass liner with it and left the other side completely untouched!I carefuly made and replaced the liner(without taking the knife apart)along with a new piece of plexiglass in place of the celluloid.Not absolutely correct but salvaged.

I have never seen, nor heard of a Robeson made picture handle knife until today.

The auction company ID'd the knife as "Robeson", but did not show a tang stamp.

Kind of makes me wonder if they knew what they were talking about.

Charlie

Thanks for the history lesson Charlie. I love stuff like that, and when there's cutlery involved it's that much better!

What a cool piece of history that knife would be, if only...........

interesting!!!! thanks fer postin ,charlie

This is great Charlie. It is an interesting collection and I am glad you recovered and posted the pics here. I do believe I have some buttons from that election and I will rummage around and try to find them.

RobesonsRme.com wrote:I have never seen, nor heard of a Robeson made picture handle knife until today.

The auction company ID'd the knife as "Robeson", but did not show a tang stamp.

Kind of makes me wonder if they knew what they were talking about.

Charlie

I agree Charlie. I just perused BRL's #3 and in the history of picture handled knives there are but a half dozen makers listed.Canton Cutlery and Novelty Cutlery were the two main makers that started producing them in 1879. Because of patent requirements other makers could not do them until Aerial did in 1909. The other makers were Golden Rule Cutlery,Lackawanna,and Wabash Cutlery. Surprisingly most of them folded in the early 1930's except Novelty which didn't go out of business until 1948!
So I would assume that it was either Novelty or Canton.It may also be marked Maher & Grosh as I have one of their catalogs from before 1900 and they advertised picture handled knives although I doubt they made them.

Well this does not directly contribute to the history of the knife but is still interesting. I thought I had some buttons from that election, but the closest are from the 1897 election of McKinley and Roosevelt timeframe.