View Single Post
  #9  
Old 04-14-2017, 11:02 AM
Jacknola's Avatar
Jacknola Jacknola is offline
Skilled
 
Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: New Orleans
Posts: 651
Good stuff Sheldon, thanks. Your comments on the dye job were very good. There are comparative pictures of home-brewed-dye-job vs lousy "shop" dyed sheaths on the "Vintage model 14" line. Here are a couple of them...

Loop dye


The inside of the knife pocket on both sheaths is un-dyed, but the older one again exhibits runs.



Something in your reply triggered a question I have long harbored. This is the segment... "...bottom of the stone bin could've been reached. " We have seen this stated many times by many different people about stones through the ages. It is now an unquestioned article of faith among collectors, that Randall has a bin full of stones and reaches in and grabs one, last-in first-out.

BUT... in your book you show a very interesting set of pictures of the process of making sheaths... admittedly not by Johnson, but still the process must have been similar. That set of pictures shows the stones being inserted during the sheath making process, by the sheath maker, not by the Randall shop.

What I have long wondered is why Johnson would make a sheath, sew on a pocket, finish the product and send it to Randall who would only then insert a stone? This means Randall had to buy stones, store them until needed, and hope they fit the generic pocket of the sheath. None of this makes business sense does it?

Good business practice would probably mean the stones were at Johnson's shop and inserted in the sheaths prior to shipping to Randall. This could mean Johnson acquired the stones, and the payment he received for his product from Randall included the cost of the stone. Or Randall bought the stones and had them shipped to Johnson. This is what seems to be shown in the pictures in your book about the process of making modern sheaths.

All this could mean there is no "deep stone bin subject to last-in-first-out" distribution in the Randall shop though it could've been at Johnson's shop. So... does/did Randall actually purchase and store the stones and insert them into the sheaths back during the Vietnam era? Do they do it now? Or were the stones bought, fitted and supplied by Johnson? What was the input on stones by the Randall shop?

Here are the relevant pictures from Sheldon's book. Thanks, Ciao




Last edited by Jacknola; 04-14-2017 at 11:42 PM.
Reply With Quote