Coffin Jack

My only Coffin knife that I found at a flea market about 8 years ago. I forgot I had it until I saw this post and remembered - FREAKING CRS! :mad: While searching for it in containers I put in the bottom of my gun safe for safe keeping - I found a few nice Case, Boker, & Bulldog folders I forgot I had too. Early onset of dementia sometimes makes it feel like Christmas for me. :confused:

Anyways back to the Coffin knife, it appears new aside from handling, The seller was asking $60 but it's customary for me to haggle at flea markets and I am pretty sure I got it for $35~ not really knowing its value but thought it was cool looking. What would a knife like this be worth in today's market? My luck ... $20 - ha ha - I wouldn't sell it anyways due to its condition and that its the only one I have.
 
I almost feel it is blasphemous to post this knife here with all of these other magnifiscent examples. But, it is the only coffin jack I own; recently acquired. And honestly, it is quite well made. The covers put me off at first. But, then I saw the Barlow Bearcat Club covers on their recent SFO and liked that. So, I figured they were close enough I could learn to live with it 😝

I posted a more in-depth review here: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/rosecraft-knives.1929475/post-22548692

 
Does anyone have insight into why Keen Kutter labels this coffin jack as a "Gunstock Jack" this was from a keen kutter catalog
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The source is page 2310 from this catalog
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ashwinearl ashwinearl interesting point. Levine (1985) says that a Coffin Jack is an old pattern alternatively called Crown Jack but it's certainly not like a Gunstock Jack.

Perhaps we forget, due to rose tinted glasses about the past...that inefficiency and mistakes occurred even then :D Might simply have been a printer's /compositor's error and the advert slipped out by mistake?

Coffin Jack and Whittler friend confer

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ashwinearl said:
Does anyone have insight into why Keen Kutter labels this coffin jack as a "Gunstock Jack" this was from a keen kutter catalog
NsowYQH.png


The source is page 2310 from this catalog
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Click to expand...



The coffin jack was actually a barrel shaped flat ended knife as Charlie pointed out on the first page. It's a very old pattern and was made at least up into the mid 20th century. Maybe Case still makes it? I have no idea. The pattern that's now referred to as a coffin jack was I believe introduced by Walden Knife Co/Keen Kutter (and shown in the above catalog image provided by ashwinearl) as their iteration of a swell center gunstock jack derived from their smaller gunstock jack pattern. I included an image from an old Walden Knife Co catalog below that shows both of those knives. As you can see for the swell center version they simply beveled the corners of the gunstock jack's cap bolsters and added a swell at the spring side. So apparently we've had the name wrong all this time! 😁

Walden Knife Co Jacks.jpg
 
This gets intriguing :cool: Walden/ Keen Kutter catalogue showing the Swell Center Gunstock Jack certainly LOOKS like what we nowadays refer to as a Coffin Jack.

But why they would opt to use their name is odd ? They say it has octogon cap, don't think I've seen a firearm with an octogon butt, might exist! I've always assumed it got called Coffin Jack simply because of its distinctive end-cap plus the decorative turning on the front bolster- sort of handle like? But hey could be the originators of his pattern so...

It is true that the original Coffin/Crown Jack 'looks more like a slender barrel or cask than it does either a crown or a coffin' , examples of which Charlie showed earlier. Whereas, Levine says the Gunstock Jack is a premium pattern with a distinctive appearance ' giving the handle very much the appearance of a rifle stock ' Looking like the Small Gunstock pattern as shown.

Names come and go I suppose, or a marketeer decides to promote a name for sales or somebody gets tired and can't think of a name ?? Mind you, Coffin Jack is kind of morbid, necrophile type of thing not exactly likely to simulate nervous superstitious buyers :eek:🤣

Great pattern mind, and I too like the 'Crooked Jack'. Unsurprisingly, it's a big thing.....like that bolster too .
 
Will I wonder if they might have used that cap shape to imitate the old octagon rifle barrels. It's definitely a mystery. Incidentally Winchester also used that descriptor in their early catalogs as well as the crooked jack name. I imagine they just transferred those names over from the old Keen Kutter/Walden catalogs once they took over that knife company as they brought along most of those old patterns as well.

Eric
 
Will it certainly does. I do think "coffin jack" is a much better name for that pattern though, they dropped the ball on that one lol. Enjoy your Easter as well!

Eric
 
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