All About Pocket Knives

Buddy of mine up in UT came across a shoe box full of old razors that a barber friend of his was wanting to sell. I bought a couple a while back and my buddy bought the rest. There were some NICE old razors in that pile.

A bit later he wanted to know if I would hone a couple for him. I said sure and he sent me this one and another Northfield that some clown in Salt Lake had "honed" on a belt sander. Interestingly enough, the one that was honed on the belt sander wouldn't shave, but it honed up easy and took a nice edge. Razor suffered from the abuse but it is a good shaver.

This punk was a straight running PITA to hone. After several tries, what seemed like a half roll of tape, and lots of nasty language, I lucked out and it started shaving. Bevel varies wildly in width, but it shaves AWESOME as a matter of fact. I tried to trade him out of it, but he was having none of that.

Some months later, I saw a Clauss USMC languishing on ebay and bought it for way less than most sell for. It was a 6/8 that had virtually no wear. It did have a couple of rust spots high up on the blade, but the razor was sound. I honed it up and like every Clauss I've ever messed with, it took a great edge and shaved wonderfully. I sent some pics to my buddy, who just happens to be a retired GySgt and he wanted it. Told him it was his for the this Northfield. I sent him the Clauss, told him to play with it and send me either the Northfield or the Clauss back. The Northfield came in Saturday.

It's a strong 5/8 about a half hollow, hard rubber scales, and I LOVE IT!!

Willie,
You got a picture of the USMC?
I don't think I have ever seen one.

Love it! Very cool old razor.

Willie, nice looking razor and a great old stamp.

orvet wrote:Willie,
You got a picture of the USMC?
I don't think I have ever seen one.

Here ya go, these are the ebay pics. There were a couple of different variations. The other was nickel plated and they have issues nowadays with the plating. This is the later model from around WWI.

Nice Northfield Willie! But I love me a Clauss

Owd Wullie wrote:

orvet wrote:Willie,
You got a picture of the USMC?
I don't think I have ever seen one.

Here ya go, these are the ebay pics. There were a couple of different variations. The other was nickel plated and they have issues nowadays with the plating. This is the later model from around WWI.
USMC1.jpg
USMC2.jpg

Do you think that one was issued?

Been a lot of speculation on that Jerry. I don't know for a fact that they were issued or not. As there were two different versions, they could very well have been issued. The earlier version was nickle plated, but the plating on those has a tendency to shed due to getting worn off at the spine and edge from honing. All that I've seen of those are usually in pretty sad shape.

General consensus is that the plated razors were issued/sold to troops around the Spanish-American war era and the ones like I posted are closer to WWI.

Bear in mind that King Gillette was giving safety razor kits to all the troops in WWI in order to get his product in front of the masses. It worked. LOL

Here you go Wullie, not as nice as your's but I don't think it's been used.
The stamp's look the same, I'm wondering if the Marine Corp bought these and stamped them.
If legit it's a nice piece of military cutlery.

Bob

Hey Bob!!

Clauss, Fremont, Ohio made and marked the razors.

Story I got is that they were issued, then King Gillette started giving his razors to the military.

The rest is pretty much history for the end of straight shaving.