All About Pocket Knives

This is a very rare sight to see two of these together both with 0000 stamped serial numbers. These photos are from a friend, the knife in the bottom photo is mine he also has one identical to this knife with the same 000 on it.

Not so rare you see Schrade made lots of display knives often using SS Salesman Sample and numerous other designations. DS display sample CS if I had to guess was customer sample. There were many some I could never figure out. I have a WWll set all marked 000 I know of several others the only difference in mine making it unique is that it is the only one with one side in brown ( burnt stag ) and one side in white. It is the real one used in the origional ads to show both options the buyers had when purchasing them. At some point Schrade decided that instead of a letter designation and zeros it would just use zeros since then they would be viewed as prototypes or real raritys by collectors and in effect they were all sample display knives. The large firm now selling most of these either dosent know this or dosen't care to explain it so people buy them thinking they have a one of a kind. A good rule of thumb ( althought it also does not alway prove true ) is that one number to trust is 001. There were times when I bought lots and would have 6 of one edition all with zeros. Schrade had lots of people and places to display knives. Most of these pieces now come from Smokey or Blue Ridge or from dealers who bought them from these out fits. They often extole them as great wonders. They are what they are nice knives but not unique. PS Tim thankyou for your condolences sorry I did not get back to you it has been and will be for a while quite hectic. However I wanted you to know I appreciated your sentiments. LT

Thanks LT
Im pleased to see you posted this as I thought perhaps someone might try and make the accusation that one of the knives must be a fraudulent copy. I already knew this was not the case and its a good test of a persons knowledge, here is a post I received from a collector friend some years ago when I was surprised to find the same ducks knife in pic below also belonged to someone else.
I definitely still call them prototypes and not just samples as they were pre-production models although it is fine if others to not what to use this label unless it applies to a singular term use only ie (the original prototype) although Ive never see a seller claim that this is what a zero stamped knife was but many times they do claim them as a 1 of 1 which is nonsence of course.

HELLO TIM,

THIS IS NOT THAT UNUSUAL. LET ME EXPLAIN HOW PROTOTYPES WERE USED.
FIRST THE DESIGNERS WOULD HAVE A MASTER CUTLER MAKE ONE KNIFE SO HE COULD PRESENT IT TO WALTER GARDNER FOR HIS INSPECTION. IF IT PASSED THAT TEST THEN THEY WOULD MAKE ENOUGH (SOMETIMES AS MANY AS 10 TO PRESENT TO THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS FOR THEIR INSPECTION. THEY WOULD THEN VOTE TO SEE IF THE KNIFE SHOULD GO INTO PRODUCTION. EACH PROTOTYPE KNIFE HAD THE ZEROS ON THEM AND THEY WERE ALL HELD BY THE COMPANY IN THERE STASH.