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Old 03-30-2015, 08:04 AM
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samg samg is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2015
Location: Matthews NC
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Early RMK stamp-number stamp Identification

Hello everyone
Name is Sam Granade. I have been involved with Randall knives for about 20 years.
My favorite era is WW2 and specifically Hunters.

A few years ago I began to follow the Heiser vs Johnson debate that dealt with trying to determine if there was a discernable difference between RMK stamped sheaths, and trying to determine who made them, Heiser or Johnson.

Jacks observations here really made a lot of sense to me. Very logical, well thought out observations. Then when the ebay sample sheaths appeared, I began digging on my own.

I have been in email communications with Ron Mathews for years because like him, I have a keen interest in early Hunters.
Ron has been a wealth of information for me, always going out of his way to encourage me and teach me, about these Hunters.
Ron, always making observations to me, pointed out that the number 3 stamp on his Heiser stamped Hunter sheaths were all flat across the top. That it differed from Johnson baby dot sheaths because the number 3 on them are rounded on the top.

So with this difference pointed out to me about the number style difference, I wanted to go deeper to see where it would lead. So I began to look at all the pictures of the back of sheaths that I could find, and kept track of them in a logical organized way. I kept the tally according to the orientation of the stamp on the sheath. Logical and easy.
When I exhausted my resources, I found a distinct, orderly pattern that to this point, I have found a few sheath models to be exceptions, because of fit/ aesthetics. More on that in a minute. There could be some abberations, some examples exist.That is the reason for this thread.

After exhausting my resources as of now, here are my observations:

Concerning observations of early RMK stamped sheaths in the approx years 1960-1982

1) West facing RMK stamped sheaths display old style serif number stamps as seen on Heiser sheaths with the Heiser logo stamp.**** See below.

2) Horizontal facing RMK stamped sheaths display old style serif number stamps as seen on Heiser sheaths with the Heiser logo stamp.**** See below.

3) East facing RMK stamped sheaths display new style non serif number stamps, as seen on Johnson baby dot sheaths.

***** Observed exceptions are:
1) sheaths that display stamps on the front of the sheath.
2) sheaths that because of short/squat belt loops as seen on JRB 12-11, appear to be turned horizontally as a result of fit or esthetics.
3) ocassional sheaths that display variations of the number stamps.
My observations have been very few of these number stamp variations.

If any of you have sheaths that definitely challenge these observations please post them. If you do not have any that challenge this observation, let us know that too.

I felt that Jack did a great job of research on the stamp orientation - snap location connection.
Perhaps this is one more step in being able to identify the difference between early RMK Heiser made and Johnson made sheaths.

Thanks for the opportunity to open this thread to discussion.

Sam Granade

Last edited by samg; 04-03-2015 at 10:40 AM.
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