so I was about to start first grade, we had moved to a "new" house in a dinky one light town, and I was trying to fit in with a new crowd, and Dad decided to give me a knife that would be generally useful.
Blade long enough to clean fish...check!
Scaler, hook remover, and cap lifter (no twist offs yet)… check!
Can Piercer (no pop tops yet) … check!
He gave me only three rules.
1. DO NOT THROW THE KNIFE!
2. do not cut anything that does not need cutting (especially self)
3. DO NOT THROW THE KNIFE!
Showed off knife to local kids who made appreciative noises. Carried it a week.
Buddy shows up one Saturday after noon and commences to throw his folder in the dirt and teaches me Mumbly Pegs as played then and there (later some kids called this version "splits" , to recover knife you have to touch it with a foot with out moving other until you either can not reach or fall down,and the version where you are not to move a foot "Chicken")
Needless to say it seemed obvious rules ONE and THREE obviously did not mean tossing at the soft sod,
I was pretty good at it.
Half an hour later we decided to see if Mom had made up and Iced any powdered fruity drink stuff.
On the way in buddy says "See that grey spot on that oak tree/" and tossed his pocket knife at it. He missed by a good four inches.
I commented on his lack of accuracy as kindly as any six year old can no doubt and he challenged "Think you can do better?"
Ha my blade was stuck less than an inch from the Grey spot....and the bladeless handle you see in the bottom of that picture was laying on the ground....and Dad's car pulled into the drive and stopped with the drivers side door right there at the tree...
Dad got out of the car. Pulled my blade from the tree. Told me "Pick up your knife, be sure you have it with you from now on to remember this lesson." So I spent months with a fish scaler that had a hook remover on it and bottle and can opener while buddies had all manner of folding knives and was much shamed.
I bought the upper knife with in the last ten years at a gun show.
Dad kept the blade in his jewelry box for decades. Mom says it is not there now....maybe he took it with him when he passed?
Mom's Dad gave me a Old Grand Dad for my seven Birthday in way of a repreieve. I carried either an Old Grand Dad or Old Timer from then until Nine and got a Official Cub Scout Knife. Not only did I carry my pocket knives to school but on Uniform Days for the Cub and Boy Scouts I wore my swivel hook belt slide and the Cub Scout Knife bounced about in public...the only issue I had was boys teasing me for not upgrading to a Boy Scout Knife when I went from Blue to Brown.
When I got out of Scouts and Started High School JROTC again Mom's Dad gave me a US Army Stainless Pocket knife ….which the LTC and All the Sargeants called a Demo Kit Knife and which when I attended Demo School at Velsek Germany in 1975 was called a Demo Kit knife so don't even start. Papa worked at Moody AFB out of Valdosta at the time as a Civilian contractor and they were cleaning out a building for re modeling and found a metal flange top six gallon bucket full of the knives and dutifully offered them to the USAF supervisor who said to throw them in the trash. Papa said there were several other guys also with bulging pockets at close of business that day. When cleaning his shop 20 years later after he passed there was one still wrapped in paper in a tool drawer.
Before going off to live with Uncle sugar I had three sheath knives for carrying in the field. The first was a "Souvinier of Florida" stamped thin blade with thin stamped riveted grips I bought with earnings from a summer job in Gatlinberg Tenn on family vacation. Right bought in Tenn and I am from Florida... piece of crap but it was an OK filet knife and "beat not having a sheath knife" for a few months.
My Papa's Fishing buddy saw it on a trip down to Crystal River to get the boat wet and frighten the fish and was appalled. When we took him home, he went in and came back out with an M5A1 bayonet which was my woods companion until Uncle Sugar gave me an M7 on loan.
A couple of years later we were back in the mountains and made another trip through Gatlingberg and I bought what Was sold as a camp knife but was in fact a Hitler Youth knife or reproduction at least with out the gaudy HJ jewel mounting no idea at the time what the blade etching words meant (later on living with Uncle Sugar in Germany an old German told me the painted red and white diamond shape on the handle I described to him was how the knives were marked the last year or so of the war, giving up the closine pin being the least a 13 year old could do for the party) It was realatively flat and thin and quite concealable around town and was. I did not carry it Germany, but soon working with a German unit saw they 1970's German Army Battle Knife and acquired one immediately....same still "butter knife", thin, and forester type grip instead of bayonet grip of the HJ knife ...much the same and yet better than my old knife. Also a full tang which the HJ knife was not "My Honor is True" but my tang was not!
Now you know more than you ever wanted to know about my carry habits as a boy.
-kBob