All About Pocket Knives

...i'm thinking 1950/60s ...?

50's - 60's would be my 'guess' too but it is just that, a guess. I have had a few in hand, the bolster marking seems to have been used over a long period but there may be some subtle differences in the tang stamping that can give a better fix on a date (range)
Are the handles a black rubbery synthetic ? or wood there seems to be some grain showing in the pics? As you can see this was in a sorry state so I gave it a make-over Derek

The handles seem to be some sort of delrin???

There appears to be a slight grain like pattern in each scale maybe a thermoplastic of some sorts IDK ...

I have a white version of that same knife.

The only thing I can speculate is that it was made post-Schrade acquisition because the bolsters look to be the same style as a couple of late 70s/early 80s clip point stag I*XL Barlows which came in Schrade-Wolstenholm boxes.

Tony that's a beauty, thank you for the info ...

Tsar Bomba wrote:I have a white version of that same knife.

Tony, that is a real beauty, indeed. What is the white handle material...Bone?...Fossil Ivory? Is it factory or a custom mod? Whatever it is, it really trips my trigger; that is one beautiful Barlow!

~Q~

I've been looking at that bolster stamp and they are different ... So maybe not post Schrade ...?

QTCut5 wrote:Tony, that is a real beauty, indeed. What is the white handle material...Bone?...Fossil Ivory? Is it factory or a custom mod? Whatever it is, it really trips my trigger; that is one beautiful Barlow!

Thanks, Q! It's certainly one of my more unique ones. I...actually can't tell what the material is, except I don't think it's bone or ivory. It might not even be original, though I see no signs that it isn't. The knife is currently within a couple boxes in a storage I used to warehouse some of the bulk knives I brought to a show/swap a while back, and I haven't gone to pick them back up yet since I've been doing a lot of remodeling at home.

The white is so uniform on it that it's hard to see some of the telltale signs of bone. It feels dense and heavy but it looks under magnification like it might be some sort of composition, a heavy plastic perhaps or something similar. It definitely doesn't feel like any of the Delrin or old black comp knives I have, but I'm doubtful that it's organic. When I have it in hand again I'll make a better effort to identify the material.

britishink wrote:I've been looking at that bolster stamp and they are different ...
So maybe not post Schrade ...?

Some excellent forensics and I think it's plain from that shot that the machining on the bolster stamps were different. I don't know where that puts us in dating the knife since I don't have many other knives to corroborate my "read" on it, but I included a pic of one of my stag Schrade I*XL Barlows in question (it's the best photo I already had that shows bolster detail, but from before I cleaned the corrosion off). The stamp from my white one more closely matches the stag one, so yours may definitely be older. The "true" Wolstenholm I*XL Barlows in my hoard are all profiled differently and are dated from early to mid-20th but the group is far from comprehensive. It is entirely possible that yours is Wolstenholm's output and that Schrade just used bolster stock/designs when they took over operations in the UK. It's all speculation at this point unless we can find a former Wolstenholm cutler employed around that time to give us the rundown.