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Old 08-10-2019, 10:21 PM
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samg samg is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2015
Location: Matthews NC
Posts: 667
I found another sheath that I think fits in the sequence. In the photo below, you have the:

1) Top Subject Brown Button sheath possibly cut out and stamped by Heiser/HKL, sewn and finished by Johnson.

** 2) Center Brown Button Sheath made by Johnson with early East facing stamp

3) Early Baby dot Johnson sheath, East facing stamp.

Joint-Pics-20190810-223544


**I'm not totally convinced that the center sheath was completely done by Johnson. Look at the pic below, (from same sheaths as above) My observations on Johnson stone pouch flaps is that they are sharper pointed at the end, The Heiser/HKL have a more blunted point to them. The center photo looks like a combination of both. Not quite as pointed, not quite as blunt.

I know it's not a perfect science to distinguish Heiser/HKL from Johnson by this attribute, but remember, the companies used dies to cut these components out, so Johnson by the time he was off and running with the baby dots, had retooled and had his own dies.


Joint-Pics-20190810-225156

Bottom line, I think we possibly have a sequence of early Johnson sheaths in the top photo, with the top sheath possibly a HKL/Johnson . Also notice the butterfly stitch on the back of all 3 are the same.

Of course, it is possible that HKL sent all dies back to Randall, as the sheath designs were probably the property of Randall Made Knives, and at first Maurice Johnson used them for a few weeks/months, then made his own dies for the next generation of Randall sheaths.
Either way, if he received unsewn sheath components and finished them, or just the HKL dies, and made them completely, the subject sheath is probably one of the earliest sheaths completed in Orlando. The truth is probably lost to the past.

Last edited by samg; 08-11-2019 at 05:14 PM.
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