All About Pocket Knives

Frank Graves wrote: ↑Fri Jan 29, 2021 3:26 pm Hi, New member here and my first post. This is a very informative website and I appreciate the opportunity to sign on here.

I have an unusual and fine 3' x 3' pocket/folding knife display case from the late 1930s (based on silver hallmarks) that has 66 various fancy folding knives, most being marked "Sloan/Kingsway" on the ricassos. The scales are silver, gold, pearl, ivory, horn and tortoise shell. Blades are silver and iron. Some of these non-knife blades are rulers, feeler gauges and some things that I don't know about. I have seen an advertisement from 1933 (Strand Magazine) showing a L. G. Sloan of Kingsway Street, London advertisement of a Waterman Pen Set containing a pocket knife with a letter opener blade similar to some in this display case. As I know of no known production of pocket knives by Sloan I am wondering if Sloan and/or Waterman may have considered selling these knives either at the London store or the NY Waterman's store in the 1930s thus the fancy display with catalog numbers beside each knife to generate interest. I have yet to find a catalog for these. There is one knife marked Needham/Sheffield (initials also on some hallmarks) so I believe that the known William Needham of Sheffield is likely the actual maker of these and that the vanity “maker” name Sloan was used to enhance their quality which is very high.

I would be very interested in any comments as to what I have here or if anyone knows of other Sloan marked knives and a catalog of them. Thanks for your consideration.


Sloan knives 2 red.jpg

peanut740 wrote: ↑Mon Dec 30, 2024 4:46 am There's a feller named Neal Punchard,who is a member on AAPK that has a good English collection and also has a lot of knife ephemera,catalogs etc.I can't remember his member name right off hand,but likely someone does.

Frank Graves wrote: ↑Tue Dec 31, 2024 10:40 pm Thanks. I hope that Neal will see this either here or over at Blade Forums. I couldn't see a way to message him.
Frank

Mason wrote: ↑Wed Jan 01, 2025 4:55 pm Sloan, London

Thanks for the vote of confidence from my friends here at AAPK and I will add what I can.

First off, that is a wonderful display of early 20th century Sheffield-made knives. It’s known that Lawrence G. Sloan was a man who owned the L. G. Sloan LTD business at 41 Kingsway in London, England. That business was a retail company for pens, pencils, and stationary, and evidently not a manufacturer of anything, especially cutlery. So Sloan, as many retail and hardware firms did, contracted out to established cutlery companies to provide them with knives branded with their own name.

It’s fairly unlikely that a catalog will turn up with a showing of Sloan’s stationary products, and highly unlikely that if a Sloan catalog did appear that it would contain the knives from the display shown. Contract knives were seldom labeled with the actual manufacturer, but as most know here on AAPK, many contract knives are “recognized” by certain traits and timelines. This can also be the case with these Sloan knives.
First, we must determine a timeframe which seems to be the teens and 20s of the 1900s for the Sloan Company, with the 1920s as the peak period. That helps to establish the possibility of which Sheffield cutlery companies were in business at that time. Next, while it is possible that the knives were sourced from different makers, they were most likely all produced from the same maker. With that in mind, Sheffield cutlery catalogs must be reviewed from that time period to see which may have produced the many different types of knives seen in the display. There is quite a range of knives shown from ruler and gauge types to folding Bowie models. That variety of knives certainly helps to narrow down the field as to which company could have offered such a range of cutlery.

With access to many Sheffield cutlery catalogs, only one stands out which offers all the knives shown in the Sloan display. That company is Francis Newton & Sons LTD which was in business from circa 1830s to 1932. There were many Sheffield cutlers operating in the early 1900s, but none that offered all the different models shown in the display. While Newton produced good quality knives, they were not in the same league as some at the top like George Wostenholm, or Joseph Rodgers. And as many here on AAPK well know, a specific name has a big impact on the perceived value of a knife.