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Permalink Reply by Jan Carter on June 30, 2014 at 11:19

Reply by Sue OldsWidow on January 30, 2013 at 21:46
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BARLOW

With its characteristically long bolster, the Barlow folding pocket knife enjoys an unique position in the history of America. No less than Mark Twain referred to a "real Barlow" in his Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn in 1876 and the Barlow was common long before that.

As popular as the Barlow knife has been, its own history is quite muddled. Depending on which source you accept, at least four different American Barlows have been reported to be its inventor. However, a careful study of the various references seems to indicate an origin in the Sheffield region of England, long famous for its cutlery.

One purported inventor of the Barlow knife was John Barlow of Ridgefield, Fairfield County Connecticut. According to S.A. Bedini in his book Ridgefield in Review, "John Barlow established a blacksmith shop on Barlow Mountain on the highway between Bennetts Farm Road and the Ledges Road. He did a thriving business shoeing horses, for this was then one of the stage coach routes. He also produced many wrought iron appliances for the home as well as tools for the farm and for the trades. His hand wrought andirons were famous in Ridgefield. According to local tradition in Scotland District, John Barlow was also a gunsmith during the years of the Revolution. His name does not appear in the rolls of the Committee of Safety of Connecticut, however, nor have any weapons been found which bear his name. It seems much more likely that he repaired guns, but did not make them.

Another tradition of the district is that John Barlow was the inventor of the Barlow knife, which was very popular in rural communities in the past century and a half." While John Barlow was apparently a very good blacksmith and may even have made some cutlery for household use, it seems unlikely that he had anything to do with folding pocket knives.

In an article Little Knife or Big Cannon-All Barlows, which was reprinted in Barlow of Barlow 1989, page 18, Odessa Teagarden said that the "Best known of the Barlow inventions, however, was the Barlow knife, a must in the pocket of every schoolboy of the Nineteenth Century. While the invention has been credited to both Milton and Thomas Barlow, it has also been called the work of Leason Barlow. Records in the United States Patent Office indicate that the latter designed it. It was superior to the cutlery which at that time came mainly from England, and remained a leading seller over a long period." I have been unable to find the patent records that Ms. Teagarden cites and I don't know what kind of a knife that Thomas, Milton or Leason Barlow were involved with in Nicholas County, Kentucky, in the latter part of the eighteenth century.

William Howard Barlow was born on November 27, 1795, at Sheffield, England, and was a son of William and Hannah Barlow of Sheffield. According to George E. Williams, who compiled a genealogy of William Howard Barlow around 1940-50, William Barlow of Sheffield was the manufacturer of the Barlow pocket knife. It was planned that his son William Howard Barlow "would enter the factory and learn the trade of pocket knife making. However, son William had no such plans as the pocket knife business held no appeal for him at the time. William ran away from home and at the age of 14 was aboard an English merchant ship bound for the West Indies. He was next heard from as a marine in the British Navy where he was on a warship bound for America to take part in the War of 1812. As the British ship attempted to land at New Orleans, they found General Andrew Jackson there also. The General soon convinced the British that New Orleans would be an unhealthy place for them to stay, so they sailed back to England, and young William with them. He was next heard of with the Duke of Wellington at the battle of Waterloo. Apparently this experience changed his mind about making pocket knives. He returned home, learned his trade and settled down to a quiet life. Along the way he took on a partner named Mills, but when they quarreled about the name to put on the knife he sold out and came to America to start his own cutlery business." He settled at Naugatuck, Connecticut, around 1850 and died there on August 07, 1880.

A fourth contender is Thomas Barlow, who was born in 1813 in England and came to America when he was 14 years old, according to the History of Tama County, Iowa. He settled first at Philadelphia but in 1854 he sold his business of making Barlow knives to Disston, the saw manufacturer, and moved to Iowa where he established a farm in Tama County. Little else is known about him or about his involvement in making a Barlow knife.

The Barlows of Kentucky, Connecticut and Pennsylvania may very well have been manufacturers of the Barlow pocket knife, but they were probably not the originators. According to Laurence A. Johnson in his article, "The Barlow Knife", that was published in The Chronicle of the Early American Industries Association, Inc. in June 1959, the Barlow knife was probably first manufactured by one Obadiah Barlow at Sheffield, England, around 1670. Obadiah's grandson, John Barlow, joined the business around 1745 and it was he who was chiefly responsible for developing the exportation of the Barlow knives to America.

The Barlow knife was designed to be a rugged knife and to be produced at the lowest possible price. To keep costs low, the blade was forged from high carbon steel and the handle was usually bone with little effort spent in polishing or other finishing. To add strength, the bolster was increased in length and weight since that is the point of greatest strain in all folding knives. Today Barlows have lost their original rough finish and their cheap price. There are often two blades (the original Barlows had only one), but the distinctive long bolster is always present, usually with the name BARLOW stamped on it.

John Russell is usually credited with being the first American to manufacture Barlow knives, although this is not certain. The John Russell Company, now the Russell Harrington Cutlery Company of Southbridge, Massachusetts, first made Barlow knives at their Greenfield Massachusetts, factory in 1785. They were called the Russell Barlow knife and instead of the word BARLOW on the bolster, they were stamped with Russell's mark, an R with an arrow through it. Today these Russell Barlows are valuable antiques.

[Note: In an e-mail dated September 2011, I am told the following: The fact is that the John Russell factory did not start production until 1833 and it began as a chisel factory. The first knives produced there were the Green River wilderness type knives. The Barlow knife they made was first displayed as a prototype at the Philadelphia Exhibition in 1876 and grew from there.]

Up until 1920 the Barlow was the standard pocket knife in the south and middle west, and it became so famous that a columnist with the Louisville, Kentucky, Courier-Journal started a club called the "Barlow Bearcats." There were no dues, duties or obligations; the only requirement of membership was the ownership of a genuine Russell Barlow.
Interesting read...book online to read
http://www.collectorbooks.com/pdf/items/7035.pdf

Permalink Reply by Jan Carter on June 30, 2014 at 11:34

Reply by Chuck Parham on August 18, 2013 at 4:52

Sue, I have attached pics of a "Barlow" I picked up at a yard sale.
 

Permalink Reply by Jan Carter on June 30, 2014 at 11:35

Sue OldsWidow said:

What is a Barlow Knife?

The term "Barlow" has two meanings when it comes to pocketknives. First, it is a style of pocket knife. Second, there was the Barlow company in the USA that made and imported pocket knives, key tags, money clips, and other quality gift products, and put your logo on them. If you are looking for either of these two "Barlow" destinations, you have come to the right place.

1. What is a "Barlow" style pocket knife?
A barlow style knife has one or two blades, a huge metal bolster, and a comfortable tear-drop shaped handle. The blade or blades are attached at the small end of the handle. Even though the first barlow knife was made in Sheffield England in the 1600's, it was made by several American shops soon after, and has become just as American as "apple pie". George Washington was known to have a barlow knife. Mark Twain referred to a "real Barlow" in his Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn in 1876. Barlows have long been gifts, treasured by young American boys. At least one song was written about the barlow knife.
Mark Twain wrote about the barlow knife in Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer...

"Mary gave him a bran-new "Barlow" knife worth twelve and a half cents; and the convulsion of delight that swept his system shook him to his foundations. True, the knife would not cut anything, but it was a "sure-enough" Barlow, and there was inconceivable grandeur in that - though where the Western boys ever got the idea that such a weapon could possibly be counterfeited to its injury, is an imposing mystery and will always remain so, perhaps."
- The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

"All the stores was along one street. They had white domestic awnings in front, and the country-people hitched their horses to the awning-posts. There was empty dry-goods boxes under the awnings, and loafers roosting on them all day long, whittling them with their Barlow knives; and chawing tobacco, and gaping and yawning and stretching - a mighty ornery lot."
- Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

The history of the barlow knife has been difficult to trace. At least four American Barlow families have claimed that they invented the barlow knife. According to Laurence A. Johnson (1) the Barlow knife was probably first manufactured by Obadiah Barlow at Sheffield, England, around 1670. (2) Obadiah's grandson, John Barlow, joined the business around 1745 and it was he who was chiefly responsible for developing the exportation of the Barlow knives to America. Another source says the barlow knife was also made by Luke Furnace of Stannington, which in the eighteenth century was a small village on the outskirts of Sheffield. Luke Furnace's name occurs in the Sheffield directories from 1774 and 1787, but not in the 1797 directory, so he was presumably dead by then. He put the mark "1760" on his knives. The original Barlow, after whom the knives are named, was working in Sheffield at the same time as Luke Furnace.
An 1823 directory of Sheffield, England cutlers (knife makers) shows Samuel Barlow on Neepsend (Street). In the Sheffield suburb of Stannington, Barlow Bros. is listed as a cutler. (3)

The barlow knife was designed to be tough, and to be affordable. To keep the price low, the blade was high carbon steel, and the handle was bone, and not much time was spent in polishing it. To make it tough, the bolster was big and thick. The original barlows had only one blade. Now they have two, and more care is taken in finishing and polishing them.
John Russell may have been the first American to manufacture Barlow knives. The John Russell Company, now the Russell Harrington Cutlery Company of Southbridge, Massachusetts, first mass produced Barlow knives at their Greenfield Massachusetts, factory in 1875. They were called the Russell Barlow knife and instead of the word BARLOW on the bolster, they were stamped with Russell's mark, an R with an arrow through it. Today these Russell Barlows are valuable antiques. (2)

Now several companies make barlow knives, and they are sold on this web page: www.barlow-knives.com. Case, Bear & Son, Boker, Robeson, and Rough Rider all make the barlow style knife currently. The Russell barlow knives were discontinued around 2009.

2. What is the Barlow Company?
The Barlow Company, which made pocketknives, among other quality gift ideas, started about 1930 in the United States. In 2003, Barlow stopped giving their products a Lifetime Warranty. About 2005, Barlow was bought by promotional product giant, Norwood. Norwood has kept the Barlow line in tact, but is gradually using their "Norwood" logo in place of the "Barlow" logo. Barlow-Norwood sells only through promotional products distributors, like Advantage-Advertising, LLC. Their knives are available on www.logo-knives.com , owned by Advantage-Advertising, LLC. Ironically, Barlow-Norwood does not currently produce a barlow style knife, but they have in the past, and could possibly resume in the future. Norwood has many fine business gifts and promotional corporate gifts available with your logoimprinted on them. Included are metal key tags, money clips, pocketknives, multi-tools, tape measures, picture frames, and clocks. Some of these items are available on www.advantage-advertising.com
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References:

(1)Laurence A. Johnson article, "The Barlow Knife", The Chronicle of the Early American Industries Association, Inc. ,June 1959

(2)The History of the John Russell Cutlery Company, 1833-1936, published 1976, Bete Press

(3)The Heritage of English Knives, David Hayden-Wright, 2008)