My Dad always carried a Camillus G. I. knife. He also carried a small "Doanes Little Liver Pills" tin box with various copper rivets and washers. Dad farmed a lot with horses, and that was his emergency kit. If he was in the field and a leather strap broke, he had the knife which had an awl and he made the hole, took a rivet out of the little tin box and fixed the problem, and finished the day.
When dad dressed up, he had a Case Stockmans, three blade knife, awl, speying blade and cutting blade, with a bone handle that he but in his dress pants. He always carried a pocket knife. He kept it up on the inside ledge of the kitchen door where us kids couldn't get it and play with it. The only time dad used that knife around the farm was when we castrated calves or hogs.
I still carry a Schrade Old Timer pocket knife today. I also have a small swiss army knife on my key chain. Its the one with the twezzers, tooth pick, scissors,nail file and blade. Just seems like everyone is asking me for my keychain knife for some small chore fairly often. My family and my relatives all know I always carry a knife.
I can't quite remember a saying about giving a boy a knife, It was something like the old saying, "Take your kids hunting,and you won't have to go hunting your kids.
Does anyone have any recollection of that? It would be great to see it again.
We were able to take our jack knives to school, and at recess we played a game called Mumbillty Peg, or Stretch. You would stand face to face, about a foot apart, feet together, and take turns throwing the knife and getting it to stick in the ground between 45 - 90 degrees up. You had to stick the knife. Then the other kid had to move his foot over to the stuck knife and it was his turn to stick the knife. This went on until some one lost his balance and fell over or couldn't stretch out any more and as a result he lost the game. There were many of these games played, but I don't remember a single instance where any one got stuck in the foot with the knife.
Damn, I can't even imagine what kind of uproar it would cause if the play ground supers saw two boys playing that game at recess today.