The Marble's USA Thread

Raymond1000 said:
I have a few Marbles knives made with Safe Grip rubber handles. One Woodcraft, one Plainsman. They were made in 2001, in the Marbles Gladstone shop. That was when Mike Stewart was at Marbles.

The handles on mine are slightly different. But mine are certainly real Marbles knives. I bought them new. The knives pictured look real to me.

They were originally made of 52-100. Later Marbles changed them to some stainless.

Eventually Marbles farmed production of the Safe Grip knives out to China.
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[emphasis added]

I understood that now all the Marbles knives are made by "CHINA" as of about 2009.

The Marble's site stopped claiming any U.S. production years ago.
 
Raymond1000 said:
I have a few Marbles knives made with Safe Grip rubber handles. One Woodcraft, one Plainsman. They were made in 2001, in the Marbles Gladstone shop. That was when Mike Stewart was at Marbles.

The handles on mine are slightly different. But mine are certainly real Marbles knives. I bought them new. The knives pictured look real to me.

They were originally made of 52-100. Later Marbles changed them to some stainless.

Eventually Marbles farmed production of the Safe Grip knives out to China.
Click to expand...

Pocketknifesheaths said:
In the years since the 1940's Marble's knife quality and output both declined steadily. The firm suspended knife production around 1977.
Sold to the guys below

When Jim & Craig Lauerman bought Marble's in 1994, they dedicated themselves to bring the company back to its former glory.
From 1997 to 2002, Marble's churned out some fixed blade knives again.
And I think they were from Tennessee - not sure, maybe someone here knows?

After WWII, the market for sheath was saturated with surplus military knives. And since that was Marble's main line, their business suffered.
In 1957 they were to make a Navy Jet Pilot's survival knife, and they did make a few, but Camillus underbid them.

Starting in mid 1960's they offered "Tiger-Wood" handles. New models were long-handled versions of old knives.

Wood-craft ..... called the - Maverick
Ideal...... called the - Longhorn
Expert ....... called the - Hunter
Sport knife..... called the - Campcraft



Now some Marble's are made in China.....
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From Mike Stewart himself ----


I was the Vice-President of marbles and in direct charge of the knife division from August of 1997 until August of 2001.

That is the Bobcat Box era.

Do You see the 4 Boxes in Steve's Picture that look Different ?

Those are not Bobcat Boxes.

All the other Boxes in the picture have an actual Bobcat on them.

The ones With the Bobcat on them are from the Time I was there.

The Box Art is from an Award Winning Michigan Wildlife Artist--Dietmar Krumrey

They changed the Box shortly after I was Gone to the Box style that had the picture of Webster marble on them.




Someone had ask him about the knives in photo below. You can read his reply below......


attachment.php


Not the Rubber handle ones for Sure.

That was after I was gone.




.
 
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What knife company did Mike Stewart run before he founded Bark River?

Blackjack Knives, Ltd.

Prior to that he and Les DeAsis, of Benchmade, had Pacific Cutlery.

Between Blackjack and Bark River, Mike was employed at Marbles. He is also still producing the USA line of Blackjack Knives for Ken Warner, who now owns the rights to the Blackjack name/logo.
 
Pocketknifesheaths said:
attachment.php


From Mike Stewart himself ----


I was the Vice-President of marbles and in direct charge of the knife division from August of 1997 until August of 2001.

That is the Bobcat Box era.

Do You see the 4 Boxes in Steve's Picture that look Different ?

Those are not Bobcat Boxes.

All the other Boxes in the picture have an actual Bobcat on them.

The ones With the Bobcat on them are from the Time I was there.

The Box Art is from an Award Winning Michigan Wildlife Artist--Dietmar Krumrey

They changed the Box shortly after I was Gone to the Box style that had the picture of Webster marble on them.




Someone had ask him about the knives in photo below. You can read his reply below......


attachment.php


Not the Rubber handle ones for Sure.

That was after I was gone.




.
Click to expand...

Thanks, pocketknifesheaths.

My chronology was off. Not for the first time, either.

The rubber handle pattern in your picture matches the knives I have.
 
Thomas Linton said:
[emphasis added]

I understood that now all the Marbles knives are made by "CHINA" as of about 2009.

The Marble's site stopped claiming any U.S. production years ago.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I know.

What I don’t know is the chronology. Did Marbles buy China-made knives before they went belly up? Did that only happen after the name was auctioned off?

I’ve forgotten the details of the Fall of the House of Marbles.

That's why my statement was deliberately vague.
 
Got my new Marbles Cattle Knife this week. What a beast! Very nice knife. Razor sharp out of the box and just a delight to handle.

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Bloefield said:
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I also have one of these, but the rivet became loose so I took it off; still sitting at the table waiting for a suitable guard and leather stack.

These are the ones I have so far:





The infamous Parker-Ontario-Marbles...regardless of the murky story, it is a solid, nice looking blade. The stack was a bit loose so I took it apart, glued them and retightened after sanding a bit of rust from the tang.



First time I saw an Expert it was love at first sight. Stalked them thru the bay for some time until I found a good deal on this one, accordingly a Stewart-era handle on a vintage blade; from smithhammer's dating system pic it seems this one was made in 1997.



Looks like a theater re-handle. Thought about putting a leather stack on it then decided it looks very cool just as it is.



Got a pretty good deal for this one, if memory serves me right the score was less than 20 bucks. Took my sweet time to sand off the rust, grind the dents off and glue/sand/stain the stack. Very sharp mofo :D

 
it was in poor shape, but I do love a challenge :D
 
Talking Marbles got me to get a few of mine out. I have a dozen or so fixed blades, including an all stag-handled one. Here's a stag slippy with a sheepfoot main, made in the USA.

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I have a couple interesting Marble's fixed blades. The first was my grandfather's Woodcraft which pre-dates the much more readily seen models marked "PAT'D1916". I remember fondly seeing my grandfather use this knife, most vividly cutting the heads off Bullhead! While I could picture the knife I did not know the manufacturer. He was born in 1892 so I would like to think he was in his early 20's when he came into possession of the knife but there is no way of knowing for sure. The knife disappeared for years and I always wondered what happened to it and one day I was rummaging around in my brother's taxidermy shop and opened a drawer in his desk, there it was! Being a knife Knut by then,the knife was instantly recognizable to me. It was very cruddy and rusty with 1/4" or so of the tip gone. My brother had been carrying the knife in the tool box of his old 520 John Deere. Scraping the crud away from the tang with my thumbnail verified my suspicions, it was a real Marble's! This was shortly after Mike Stewart's rebirth of Marble's. I fired a letter off to Mike and he said to send the knife in and he would take a look at it. Sent it back to me with the blade issues corrected and everything else as found, no charge whatsoever! While not original it was at least refurbished by Marble's and is the absolute centerpiece of my collection.

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Marble's knives produced during Mike's tenure were very fine blades indeed. Do not ever hesitate to buy those Bobcat boxed beauties. Razor sharp and great cutters. The only one I have remaining is a rubber handled Plainsman model that I had the privilege of supplying to Ed Fowler with which he compared the cutting performance of the new Marble's against a vintage model of his own. The new model prevailed and I sure wish I still had the correspondence from that time.

Pictures coming tomorrow!
 
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