I dont seem to take a tour every year, shame on me.  This year while I was able to, Donnie was not.  He spent a lot of his time on the front porch greeting and chatting and taking care of Casey Dog.

While on the tour, I wrote as fast as I could and thought i would take you all with me (as best I can)

The first stop on the tour is set up. Although you dont get to go down on the floor where Ms. Betty is setting up bolsters and the first pieces of the frame,you do get to see the operation from the top floor looking down.  One of the portions I like is that they have a set up for every station you can not get to live.  So for the first stop we see our tour guide and his crew and the set up for the making of a Great Eastern Cutlery knife.

As you can see from the parts, stop one has 4 presses.  The first one is the Brass Press and then the Tommy Press sets the bolsters, then a trim press removes the excess material and the mark press marks the spot for pinning.  The bolsters are 752 nickle silver heated with oxy acetylene.  The pin is actually a part of the bolster, not welded on.  GEC manufactures their own parts for this