got me started thinking of the knife that really was “My Precious” during my early childhood days, the red handled Mora fixed blade Boy Scout knife.
I had no pictures of it and had to use something I found on the net, but this weekend I found it in a box and brought it out for the first time in many years.
I wrote:
"I fell instantly and profoundly in love with my first fixed blade knife, the red handled Boy Scout knife, when it was given to me by my father. I used it much and I used it hard and I remember a growing anxiety: What if I loose it, break it or “use it up”? How can I ever live without one? I needed to get a spare one! When I got some money I did not buy candy but saved them for a second Boy Scout knife. It was to be one with a blue handle. But in the local hardware store they also had one with a green handle… More money to be saved and I eventually got the green one too. Knifeaholism can strike at an early age.
I kept using the red one and kept both the blue one and the green one as spares.
When my oldest son was old enough to get his own knife, I gave him the choice between the blue one and the green one. He chose the green handled. It was lost a couple of years later during a weekend's stay in a cabin in the forest.
The blue one became the first fixed blade knife for my youngest son and he still has it."
Well… Here it is.
When you look at the blade you can see that this knife really was a user. You can also se the result of a young boy trying to sharpen his knife but not knowing too much about how to do it…
My childhood just wouldn't have been the same without this knife..! My first pocket knives are all lost, but fortunately I still have this one.
The blue one, purchased a year or two later, is the knife given as a first fixed blade knife to my youngest son.
He likes knives but not to the extent that I did and do – and his knife is not even close to as worn as mine.
Another thing is that when I grew up a kid wearing his Boy Scout knife was much more commonly seen and more accepted than today…
