Backpacking/Climbing Knives of the 1960s, 70s and 80s?

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pinnah

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So, we had a lively discussion on this question in the Traditional forum and I thought I'd run it up the cyber flag pole here. Hopefully some of you all can add some more insight. I would particularly happy if those of you who know the bushcraft literature (e.g. Kochanski, Mears) can weigh in on the knives they recommended, even if they aren't in the backpacking/climbing traditions, per se.

QUESTION: What knives were popular for backpacking, hiking and mountaineering during the 1960s, 70s and 80s?

Obviously, the Swiss Army Knife (SAK) is almost synonymous with backpacking but it's not clear when it gained broad acceptance among backpackers. Nor is it clear to me what other knives were popular and when.

PLEASE NOTE: I am not looking for advice on what sort of knife to carry or buy today. I'm really only interested in hearing about knives in use in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. In particular, I'm interesting in hearing more about the popularity of traditional pocket knives, including the SAK, the Opinel and the traditional "jack knife" for use among backpackers and climbers during the time.

My hunch here is that most people got their knives from some place other than a backpacking and climbing store and I'm trying to get a bead on this.

If you were hiking and climbing during that era or if you were working in shops catering to backpackers during that time, I would love to hear your reflections.

If anybody has or can point to catalogs outfitters of the day that would show what knives were carried, that would be ideal.

Some specific questions:

SAKs - When did they start to become popular among backpackers and climbers? What stores carried them? Which models were the most commonly seen and used?

Boy Scout Knives and Traditional Pocket Knives - These include "Boy Scout Knives" made by Ulster and Camillus among many others. This also traditional "jack knives" like those made by Case, Schrade, Boker and others. Were these commonly used? What brands to you recall being sold in backpacking stores or catalogs?

Buck Knives - These are the large, wood and brass folding hunting style knives like the Buck 110 and 112, as well as the numerous knives of the same style sold by other manufactures like Schrade, Ka-Bar, Camillus and Case. Did you see this style of knife in use during that these times periods? What backpacking or climbing stores carried them?

Multitools - The first Leatherman tool appeared in the early 80s and the Early Winters catalog carried them in the 1982 or 83 time frame. Did you see multitools on the trail during the 80s? Which brand? What stores or catalogs carried them?

Tactical Folders - The Spyderco CO1 Worker was introduced in 1981 featuring a large hole in the blade allowing for one hand opening. Did you see similar tactical folding knifes on the trails during the 1980s? Did any backpacking or climbing stores that you know of sell knives of this sort?

Traditional Fixed Blade Knives - These include hunting knives like the Buck 119 and military knives like the classic Ka-Bar. Did you see them in use backpacking or climbing and were they carried by backpacking and climbing stores?



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I'll start... I was just a boy in the 1960s, which meant goofing around in the Scouts or raising havoc in the neighborhood with a BB gun. I got my first Ulster made Scout knife when I was 8 and lost several. I recall going to Sears stores to buy replacements with my folks, usually with a sterm lecture to take better care of my knife. This continued through the early 70s. I lived in teh mid-west and had never heard of backpacking or climbing. Just camping.

In the mid to late 70s, I discovered skiing and backpacking. I also discovered the REI mail order catalog, which tooks its place on my reading stand next to a stack of Herter's catalogs. Herters sold hunting and fishing supplies. While I still have an old SACS Millet rucksack that I purchased in 1978, I don't recall ever seeing a knife in an REI catalog. I did order a Buck 110 from Herters though, as well as a cheap Barlow.

I remember visiting "mountain shops" in Vermont in the 70s when we would visit in the summer and I remember buying various bits of "gear" like a down jacket (Mountain Lion) and my first real hiking boots (Lowa) but I don't recall seeing knives for sale. Just have no recollection.

I saw my first dedicated brick and mortar outdoor store in the early 80s when I went to college there. There was Wilderness House on Comm Ave and across the street, the big Eastern Mountain Sports. My interest in visiting those stores was more towards things like crampons, sleeping backs and stoves. Again, I just have no memory of what knives were sold there.

I do recall getting my first multitool towards the end of the 80s; a SOG Paratool which went into my pack for a long time.
 
Growing up in the 80's in rural NYS the traditional style buck or (110) knife was synonymous with anything outdoors. While I was never much for a climber. the 110 was pretty much standard issue among hunters and campers of the time
slightly less popular bu still prevalent where the leather stacked handled carbon bladed sheath knives made by western

I didn;t see Saks really take off till after the first season of MacGyver in the 80's

and I didn;t see my first spyderco I guess till 91
 
60s
I was in England in the Scouts and later in the Army Cadets (ROTC)
In Scouts I had a 5" Sheffield stag handled sheath knife and Camper four bladed penknife (these we standard)
In Army Cadets I carried a British Army issue Clasp knife
Later on I purchased a SAK (not Victorinex)
(I also purchased some Sheffield carbon kitchen knives that I still use daily!)

70s
I was in NYC
Gerber came out with the Sportsman series, and I carried backpacking the larger brass and rosewood model, which I hardly ever used
Also I carried the older the SAK and I purchased a SAK Classic for my First Aid Kit
That is all I carried for years of very extensive packbacking
(I worked as a Union Electrician and carried on my tool belt a standard Coloninal electicians knife, but never took it backpacking)
I also purchased a US Demo, but never really carried out of favor to the SAK

70s in NYC, there was a backpacking store called Paragon Sports
And they had a superb knife counter
I purchased the Gerber I and the Gerber II
BUT!!!
I returned them got credit, as they were too military, and too illegal to carry in NYC (Sullivan's Law)
I wanted a Buck folder but they pointed me to the Gerber Sportman, which was much more lovely in the F&F (still have it with the original grind as it never needed sharpening, just polished the brass many times)
And I carried that on my belt as a legal carry


80s
Back in England for a time
Early 80s, I was gifted a Opinel when I was was working in Brittany France.
It became my backpacking carry instead of the Gerber Sportsman
I also purchased a very small Victorinex kitchen paring knife for my cook kit
Mid 80s, I purchased a Buck Bucklite 112, and that and the SAK became my carry for almost all subsiquent backpacking
The Bucklite and US Demo became my carry in the Israeli Army, with main usage being the Demo given I was in SAR


And until I became infected by Bladeforums that is all I really carried.................
 
pinnah said:
...... While I still have an old SACS Millet rucksack that I purchased in 1978, ..........
......... I remember buying various bits of "gear" like a down jacket (Mountain Lion) ................
.
Click to expand...

In the 70s

I sold my Millet Rucksack and Summit pack from REI, one of the more stupid things I have done
I still have my Mountain Lion Polyester Parka and sleeping bag, they were superb quality (unfortunately they went bankrupt in the late 70s)

I also have no recollection of seeing any camping knives in the catalogs of EMS, REI, or LL.Bean (when they were still 'real' not uppie)
LL. Bean sold Chicago kitchen knives, and I still have a paring knife with LL.Bean on the side
 
1976 example from the work: The Complete Outdoorsman's Handbook by Jerome J. Knap.
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First girlfriend gave me a wood handled Vic. florist knife...I carried it everywhere, it might be the only blade I ever sharpened so many times that I changed the edge geometry from a Wharnie to a spear point.

1978 Buck 110 went with me to the Norwegian Merchant Marine Academy...spent all my free time in the woods.
Came home with a red handled Mora and a large Laplander.

Somewhere in there I carried a Cold Steel Outdoorsman with a Vic. Champion...my overkill period as the CS was too pretty to use properly.
 
Might be a little more Sportsman than Woodsman in this comment from the 70s and 80's, but have to agree with the Buck 110. And the 'premium' were the Gerber Brass folders - high quality 440C made here in the USA. I still have a few brass folders and Silver Knights from Gerber.

Camping in my memory were SAKs and Marbles or copy of Marbles (Western) sheath knives.

You might like this article although it goes back even further than you are looking...

http://masterwoodsman.com/2013/classic-camping-knives/
 
Wow. Great reading!

More camping/woodcraft oriented than I'm looking but excellent background.

My sense is that backpacking, as a distinct and different sport from camping, got a foot hold in the 50s and 60s when engineers like Jack Stephenson (Warmlite) and Dick Kelty (Kelty) applied technologies from aerospace to create the first "real" backpacks that transferred weight to the hips using lightweight materials like aluminum and nylon. Soon after, the 1970s rolled around with the counter-culture of anti-war and pro-Earthday. With this came the rise of a) new equipment manufacturers (including European imports) in the 60s and 70s, b) dedicated backpacking & climbing stores (often called "mountain shops" in the 70s and c) eventually the emergence of backpacking/climbing equipment distributors (like Adventure 16) and national retailers (like REI) who helped consolidate product offerings in the 80s.

At the same time and in parallel, the 70s and 80s were when the traditional US knife business was wobbling and teetering. There were massive amounts of consolidation (Schrade) and then Western and Schrade shut down after the 80s, followed by Camillus. Buck did well on account of the popularity of the 110 though and of course, the Leatherman appeared in the early 80s.

In any event, I'm very interested in learning more about which brands got used for Backpacking and Climbing during this time period and where people bought them. Very much related, I'm curious as to how the traditional US makers seemed to miss the backpacking and climbing boom of the 70s and 80s. The Masterwoodsman article provides some great background for that.
 
Pinnah,

I am not clear
Are you asking only about knives
Or Camping/mountaineering gear?
 
To give you a timeline I was 1 in 1960.
My first real knife was out of a U.S. Army Mess kit. I carried that until I was 10(1970).

At that point my dad gave me his Schrade-Walden Bear Head fixed Blade. I carried that into the late '90s. I was heavy into Backpacking and Mountianeering, and the alpinists of the era. Insted of Farah, I had a poster of the Himalaya in my room.

I went through the time period when people thought you were an eco-terrorist if you wore Vibram soles or had a campfire. I wore Vibram soles and had campfires. Made for some interesting debates.

I grew up in Upstate New York and never saw any real altitude, but camped and hiked, and snowshoed in all four seasons all over the Catskills and Adirondacks, in the backing style you describe. I looked up to people such as Yvon Chouinard, Lowe, and other alpinists.

But still my Schrade-Walden remained on my side or in my pack. When they arrived on the scene, I added a leatherman to my kit, but more for tool than knife.

From the late '70s through the '80s, I worked at a ski center as a Snowmaker and later ran the department. So I had both need and opportunity to add some high-end Alpine Gear to my Kit. Working on a mountain in the winter, at night, is as close as you can get to an alpine environment without actually being in one. I added Koflach boots, Wilderness Experience Pile, Gaitors, Gore-tex, and other high end gear of the day.

My knife remained on my side through WFR training in Pinkham Notch in the early '90s. After that I started to acquire more knives, and it saw less belt time. I finally my retired my dads knife in 1999 when he passed away to a place of honor that it richly deserves. On the back of it's sheath is carved the date "1955"

It will still take hair off my arm to this day.

I personally never carried a SAK, although many of my friends did. I used Patagonia gear before it got trendy and over priced. EMS and REI were and still are, my main resources. Along with Rock and Snow in New Paltz, N.Y. I liked to read Mariah before it merged with Outside,

I still miss Wilderness Experience, both the company and the gear they made.

Hope that helps ya,
 
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"I still miss Wilderness Experience, both the company and the gear they made."

You can still buy "their" sleeping bags. They were made by Slumberjack.
 
My first real fixed blade was a USAF survival knife. This was about 1984 right in the middle of the crappy hollow handle knife craze. Even as a kid I knew they were junk. I remember showing it to a friend and he tried to unscrew the hex head pommel because he thought it had a hollow Handel. Still have the knife.
 
In the '70's, I carried a Case camper/Boy Scout pattern knife. (I lost it then found it many years later, and now I can't find it!). My other "woods" knife was a Schrade Stockman, which I still have. (It, too, was lost... in a lake, then found a couple of years later when I was SCUBA diving! Photo below....) My fixed blade was a nice little Western with stag handle scales and an aluminum pommel. It was lost due to a sheath failure. :( The sheath was very nice. It was tooled with a floral pattern; sort of like holly w/berries.



Stay sharp,
desmobob
 
Just found this thread and here's my .02 cents. I was 15 in 1970 and SAKs were often seen. Most people bought their knives at Sears, JCPenneys, Montgomery Wards or a hardware store like Ace or Western or the many mom and pop stores. Mail order meant LLBean or Campmor ( and Bean was much more gear intensive then). Surplus stores abounded and still had mountains of authentic gear dirt cheap and often as far back as WW1. Often rusting, often mildewed, but authentic and cheap. I don't remember seeing surplus Kabars per se, but the standard hunting knife design of the 50s and 60s is the same style as the KaBar (Marble's Ideal pattern, generic) , with polished leather grip and aluminum hammer pommel. Buck 119s were very common and the 110 was a common folder. Sociologically, no one flinched at the sight of a large belt knife being worn as some might now. Gear of all kinds was much heavier than today and that was fine. THE COMPLETE WALKER was the backpackers bible.
 
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In Northern Calif. back then it was common to see most guys using a Buck 119 or 110.
 
Also the Stockman and other two or three bladed folders with horn or bone handles were very common. Some junk stores and flea market stalls would have a shoebox full, each a dollar or two. Backpacks in the early 1970s were usually Kelty's external aluminum frame jobs. Hiking pants meant Levi's jeans, even in Florida in August. Hiking boots weighed a ton. The gram-counting weenies who fret over every fraction of an ounce , who have become such a factor in today's gear design, that generation had not even been born in the '70s. Titanium in cookware, etc had not been introduced. Svea 123 stoves were cutting edge design. In keeping with the hippie off-the-grid mindset, much of the gear seen on the trail was either recycled from a thrift store or Mom's kitchen or made and improvised for yourself. It would have been tough to get average pack weight much below 40 pounds using the gear and materials available at the time, and people did long hauls with 50 and 60 pounds. Most normal people who considered themselves serious backpackers did not own a home scale and had only a vague idea of what most of their individual items, or their pack as a whole, weighed. It was pretty frequent to see hatchets, both steel and wood. Machetes were usually GI Surplus pattern. I don't remember seeing any USAF survival knives in the field at that time, I think now they did not hit the surplus market until long after the Vietnam era was over. But civilian sheaths with leather snap pockets for sharpening stones were common.
 
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