Half-stops on Schrade Cut Co knives. When did they stop this practice?

[bladecollectorr]

At this point I only have 10 "Schrade Cut Co" stamped oldies. They are all gent's knives.

An SFO 7309GSil with an early date on it of "1915-1916" was my first Cut Co with half-stops.

I just received a F7426 and it too has half-stops.

Does anyone know when Schrade stopped making knives with half-stops? Was it a running change that happened over time, depending on the pattern? Was it a hard change to all models on a particular date?

I would appreciate any replies regarding Schrade's use of half-stops and whether or not it's a way to narrow the manufacturing date on older Cut Co knives.

 

[TheChunk91]

Half stops were usually pattern specific, as opposed to age. There are walden era knives with half stops, they still used them for a little while after the cut co era. I don't know of a way to accurately date schrades based of half stops, but someone may.

 

[bladecollectorr]

Half stops were usually pattern specific, as opposed to age. There are walden era knives with half stops, they still used them for a little while after the cut co era. I don't know of a way to accurately date schrades based of half stops, but someone may.

Thanks Chunk, after reading your reply I did some more digging and found this Schrade Walden: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/nice-oldie.579329/#post-5925769

I was thinking there were no Schrade Walden examples. The Schrade Walden timber scribe had half-stops too from reading another thread.

I guess my inquiry was mainly based around half-stops in Cut Co gent's knives because I'm trying to date/identify one I can't find in catalogs and never really went down this path before.

I was saving them for a glorious "shiny silver things" family-photo when I was done polishing all my appropriate knives but I will take some pics of the knives in question since they are handy. Pics to follow...

 

[bladecollectorr]

There were four knives that I thought were the same basic pattern but once I had all of them beside each other I realized that it was two similar pairs and not four of the same.

Here are the four knives I am comparing. The knife on top is the mystery knife followed by F7426, 7309GSil and M7099GSil Shac. The middle two knives from my original post are a match size-wise at 3-1/8" long. The top and bottom knives match size-wise at 3-1/16" long and frame is not as wide as the middle two. It was hard to notice these 1/16" differences until I had them all together.

I think you are correct in that it seems to be pattern specific use of half-stops.

Here are the two without half-stops. On the left is the M7099GSil Shac from 1936 supplement. The one on the right is the one I can't specifically identify. It has mirror-polished faux-bolsters and the centre area between the threading has a pebbled kind-of sand-blasted finish

Name that knife? Cheers!

 

[jxr1197]

I can't add to the half stop discussion but wanted to point out it's kind of amazing to see a straight line tang stamp on a knife you can actually date to 1915.That's a cool piece right there!

 

[bladecollectorr]

Thanks jxr. I went after the knife for precisely that reason. It's nice to have a Schrade oldie with a date on it.

There seem to be two Schrade tang-stamp charts that float around the collecting world.

The first one (seen above) is NOT really accurate regarding the use of the straight line stamp vs arched stamp. It was taken from a seemingly lightly researched magazine article. I explored this a little on AAPK and the concensus is that Schrade used the arched stamp on bigger blades but the straight line stamp was used at the same time on smaller blades.

The second chart (seen below) is from the heavily researched Goins book and more accurately reflects the use of both stamps overlapping.

 

[jxr1197]

Cool! I got some reading to do. I never noticed the contradicting dates in Goins. I don't know that I agree the Knife World article is lightly researched. He does list sources, Levine among them. At the same time I know Goins is more of the gold standard on these things but of course everything is done using the best info available at the time. The same Goins list that gives us straight line stamps starting in 1904 is also showing arched stamps until 1946 and Walden NY (no USA) until 1973. Nowadays we know both of those are inaccurate, and there are plenty of small blade arch stamps out there like in the pic below. I'll try to find the thread you mentioned because now I'm curious! Either way I'm still impressed with your knife. Thanks for adding the perspective.

 

[jxr1197]

I found the thread you mentioned and learned a thing or two there - great stuff. I don't think anyone could argue that stamp transitions weren't gradual. I have a 2201 with arched stamps on the caps and straight lines on the blades. I used to assume it was probably made around 1917. Now I'm guessing it was probably made around 1915. Who knows? It's not like there was a day when it happened all at once. I'm inclined to believe your knife is what it appears to be - a straight line knife from 1915, pushing that fuzzy transition back a few years from what is popularly believed. I'm also thinking now that the Knife World chart is leaps and bounds more accurate than Goins on the matter - but it was written years later with far more information available - including the tidal wave of info that appeared with the internet and forums and ebay, etc. I've been spending a silly amount of time lately researching Cuchilleria Imperial - Baer's foray south of the border that produced the Imperial Hecho en Mexico knives that pop up occasionally. Since it was so long ago in the dark pre-internet days I have found that what little information exists about the subject is mostly wrong. Again because of the lack of digital data being available when the research was done. In one of Levine's installments in Knife World back in 1980 a collector wrote in to ask about a few knives including a Mexican Imperial. Levine replied that the knife was not related to Imperial Rhode Island and he did so using the resources he had available to him at the time - just like Goins did.
I have a couple of dated knives I picked up for the same reason you did - because dating a Schrade is typically impossible and if the knife falls around any transition it becomes all the more significant. The first is a Walden 758 with the NY USA stamp which is one I have heard started sometime in the early 50's. I have never seen a year, or even a range of years mentioned though. The 758 is stamped Gulf States Utilities Company and I bought it from the granddaughter of the original owner. He was a lineman down in Texas who worked on connecting the national power grid there. The flip side of the knife is marked Safety Awards 1952. So now I know the transition started at least by then - maybe even earlier, who knows. The other knife is a Delrin 8OT that is dated 1962.
Getting back to the AAPK thread though, I also picked up from that conversation that the ultimate unicorn probably never existed. I can stop searching for a Germany stamped tang now. That's a load off my mind, lol! So if we nix that first stamp from both charts then it looks like the S.C.Co stamp gets promoted to stamp number one and I already slayed that unicorn
Thanks for the tip on the stamp convo, it really changed the landscape on a few key issues.

 

[bladecollectorr]

I did indeed speak too conclusively regarding the quality of the two charts. They both have their errors.

Thanks for your detailed replies and pics jxr.