Switchblade - History - Automatic Knives 1900-1945

Automatic Knives 1900-1945

Swordmakers in Toledo, Spain developed a market in the 1920s for gold plated automatic leverlock knives with pearl handles and enamel inlaid blades. Italian knifemakers had their own style of knives including both pushbutton and leverlock styles, some bearing design characteristics similar to the early French Châtellerault knife. Prior to World War II, hand crafted automatic knives marked Campobasso or Frosolone were often called Flat Guards because of the two-piece top bolster design. Some Italian switchblades incorporated a bayonet-type blade equipped with a blade lock release activated by picking a lever at the hinge end, and were known as 'Picklocks'. These were later supplanted by newer designs which incorporated the blade lock release into a tilting bolster, which released a spearpoint or bayonet-style blade.

In the United States, commercial development of the switchblade knife was primarily dominated by the inventions of George Schrade and his New York Press Button Knife Company, though W.R. Case, Union Cutlery, Camillus Cutlery, and other U.S. knife manufacturers also marketed automatic knives of their own design. Most of Schrade's switchblade patterns were automatic versions of utilitarian jackknives and pocket knives, as well as smaller penknife models designed to appeal to women buyers. In 1903, Schrade sold his interest in the New York Press Button Knife Co. to the Walden Knife Co., and moved to Walden, New York, where he opened a new factory. There Schrade became the company's production superintendent, establishing a production line to manufacture several patterns of Schrade-designed switchblade knives, ranging from a large folding hunter to a small pocket knife. Walden Knife Co. would go on to sell thousands of copies of Schrade's original bolster button design.

The advertising campaigns of the day by Schrade and other automatic knife manufacturers focused on marketing to farmers, ranchers, hunters, or outdoorsmen who needed a compact pocket knife that could be quickly brought into action when needed. In rural areas of America these campaigns were partially successful, particularly with younger buyers, who aspired to own the most modern tools at a time when new labor-saving inventions were constantly appearing on the market. Most American-made switchblades made after 1900 were patterned after standard utilitarian pocketknives, though a few larger Bowie or Folding Hunter patterns were produced with blade shapes and lengths that could be considered useful as fighting knives. Most had flat or sabre-ground clip or spear-point blade profiles and single-sharpened edges. Blade lengths rarely exceeded five inches (12 cm). A few manufacturers introduced the double switchblade, featuring two blades that could be automatically opened and locked with the push of a button.

At the low end of the market, Shrapleigh Hardware Company of St. Louis, Missouri manufactured thousands of switchblades under the trademark Diamond Edge for distribution to dealers across the United States and Canada. Most of these knives were novelty items, assembled at the lowest possible cost. Sold off display cards in countless hardware and general stores, many low-end Diamond Edge switchblades failed to last more than a few months in actual use. Other companies such as Imperial Knife and Remington Arms paid royalties to Schrade in order to produce automatic "contract knives" for rebranding and sale by large mail-order catalog retailers such as Sears, Roebuck & Co.

In 1904, in combination with his brothers Louis and William, George Schrade formed the Schrade Cutlery Co. in Walden, and began developing a new series of switchblades, which he patented in 1906-07. Schrade's new Safety Pushbutton Knives incorporated several design improvements over his earlier work, and featured a handle-mounted operating button with a sliding safety switch. A multi-blade operating button allowed the knife to operate with up to four automatic blades. In successive patents from 1906 through 1916 Schrade would steadily improve this design, which would later become known as the Presto series. With the Presto line, Schrade would largely dominate the automatic knife market in the United States for the next forty years. Schrade would go on to manufacture thousands of contract switchblade knives under several trademarks and brands, including E. Weck, Wade & Butcher, and Case XX, while other companies used Schrade's patent as the basis for their own switchblade patterns. Among these were pocket and folding hunter pattern switchblades bearing the name Keen Kutter, a trademark owned by E.C. Simmons Hardware Co. (later purchased by the Shrapleigh Hardware Co.).

Having earned a handsome return from his work, Schrade traveled to Europe in 1911, first to Sheffield, England, where he assisted Thomas Turner & Company in expediting a wartime order from the British Navy. He next moved to the knifemaking center of Solingen, Germany. Schrade was fully aware of Solingen's reputation for having the best cutlery steel in Europe, and he opened a factory to produce his safety pushbutton switchblade knife there, which would become known as the Springer. In 1915 or 1916 Schrade sold his Solingen holdings (some sources state they were seized by the German government) and returned to the United States. However, his German Springer would live on; Schrade's design and switchblades derived from it were manufactured by various craftsmen in Solingen for many years thereafter.

In 1918, Captain Rupert Hughes of the U.S. Army submitted a patent application for a specialized automatic-opening trench knife of his own design, the Hughes Trench Knife. This was a curious device consisting of a folding spring-loaded knife blade attached to a handle which fastened to the back of the hand and was secured by a leather strap, leaving the palm and fingers free for grasping other objects. Pressing a button on the handle automatically extended a knife blade into an open position and locked position, allowing the knife to be used as a stabbing weapon. The Hughes Trench Knife was evaluated as a potential military arm by a panel of U.S. Army officers from the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) in June 1918. Unfortunately, after testing the board found the Hughes design to be of no value, and it was never adopted. Hughes went on to patent his automatic trench knife in 1919, though Hughes appears to have been unsuccessful in persuading a knife manufacturing company to produce his design.

Upon returning to the United States, Schrade made a final improvement to his Presto series of switchblades, filing his patent application on June 6, 1916. The next year, Schrade licensed a new flylock switchblade design to the Challenge Cutlery Company, which he then joined. Under the trademark of Flylock Knife Co., Challenge made several patterns of the flylock switchblade, including a large 5-inch folding hunter model with hinged floating guard and a small pen knife model designed to appeal to women buyers. A Challenge Cutlery advertisement of the day depicted a female hand operating a fly-lock automatic pen knife, accompanied by a caption urging women to buy one for their sewing kit so as not to break a nail while attempting to open a normal pen knife. Schrade pursued his knifemaking interests at both Challenge and at Schrade, where his brother George now managed one of the company's factories.

From 1923-1951, the Union Cutlery Co. of Olean, New York produced a series of lever-operated switchblades designed for the mid and upper end of the market, featuring celluloid, stag, or jigged bone handles, a bolster-mounted pushbutton, all featuring the company's KA-BAR trademark on the blade tang. The line included the KA-BAR Grizzly, KA-BAR Baby Grizzly, and KA-BAR Model 6110 Lever Release knives. The largest model was KA-BAR Grizzly, a folding hunter pattern with a broad bowie-type clip point blade.

On September 21, 1926, George Schrade patented a new switchblade design, the Wire Jack. Unlike most switchblades, the Wire Jack was simple and inexpensive to manufacture in large quantities. The knife was made of two pieces of welded wire, a blade, a blade liner, and a rivet. The first model lacked protection for the fingers, and later a sheet-metal guard was added to the butt portion of the knife. As a low-cost knife, the Wire Jack was often distributed as part of an advertising campaign, and because of its low cost was popular with Boy Scouts. In 1928, after the death of Challenge Cutlery's owner, Charles F. Wiebusch, the company was dissolved, and Schrade was given some cutlery machinery in lieu of royalties owed him for the flylock switchblade. With this machinery and a few ex-Challenge employees he formed a second company, the Geo. Schrade Knife Company, primarily to manufacture his Presto series of switchblade knives. In 1937, Schrade came out with two more low-cost switchblade knives designed to appeal to youth, the Flying Jack and the Pull-Ball Knife. The Flying Jack had a sliding operating latch and could be produced with one or more automatically opening blades. The Pull-Ball opened by pulling a ball located on the butt end of the handle. Schrade would later manufacture alternative configurations to the ball operating handle, including dice, rings, eight balls, or different colors. Unfortunately, the Pull-Ball required two hands to open, removing much of the switchblade's utility as a one-handed knife. As the blade catch mechanism required a good deal of space within the handle, the knife's blade length was short relative to its handle length. Schrade manufactured many pull-ball knives for sale under other brands, including Remington, Case, and the "J.C.N. Co." (Jewelry Cutlery Novelty Company of North Attleboro, Massachusetts) Always looking for a new way to appeal to customers, Schrade continued to experiment with new forms of switchblade designs up to the time of his death in 1940.

In the late 1930s the German Luftwaffe began training a Fallschirmjäger or paratroop force, and as part of this effort developed specialized equipment for the airborne soldier, including the Fallschirmjäger-Messer (paratrooper's knife), which used a gravity-operated mechanism to deploy its sliding spearpoint blade from the handle. The German paratrooper knife, which featured a marlinspike in addition to the cutting blade, was used to cut rigging and unknot lines, though it could be employed as a weapon in an emergency. In 1940 the U.S. Army in 1940 tasked the Geo. Schrade Knife Co. to produce a small single-edge switchblade for U.S. airborne troops, to be used similarly to the Fallschirmjäger-Messer. The knife was not intended primarily as a fighting knife, but rather as a utility tool, to enable a paratrooper to rapidly cut himself out of his lines and harness in the event he could not escape them after landing. The company's submission was approved by the U.S. Army Materiel Command in December 1940 as the Knife, Pocket, M2. The M2 had a 3.125-inch clip-point blade and featured a carrying bail. Except for the bail, the M2 was for all intents and purposes a copy of George Schrade's popular Presto safety-button civilian model. The M-2 was issued primarily to U.S. Army paratroopers during the war, though some knives appear to have been distributed to crews and members of the Office of Strategic Services. When issued to paratroopers, the M2 was normally carried in the dual-zippered knife pocket on the upper chest of the M42 jump uniform jacket. After the war, the M2 was manufactured by Schrade (now Schrade-Walden, Inc.) as the Parachutist's Snap Blade Knife (MIL-K-10043) under a postwar military contract. In addition, other companies such as the Colonial Knife Co. made civilian versions of the M2 after the war.