Great Eastern Cutlery hosted by Ken Mundhenk

Collectors of Great Eastern, Northfield and Tidioute Knives

  • Ken Mundhenk

  • Ken Mundhenk

    Great Eastern has just added: 73 Scout with Red Stag, 440C Stainless Steel Skinner and Spey Blades
  • Roger Cunningham

    For a modern knife,they have the feel of one made 100 years ago.

  • In Memoriam

    Scott King

    Good job Ken. Great Eastern is a popular brand and is one of the most widely watched videos at CNJ YouTube Channel. Maybe you can get some of the executives of the company to come by and answer questions and talk about some of their product line. That'd be great for the GE collectors.
  • Ken Mundhenk

    Thanks Scott, and Roger for joining GEC group. I know you guys are aware of the fine knives GEC are putting out. As new ones come out I'll post pic's so everyone can see them. I've invited Ryan Daniels, Sales Manager of GEC to join us here, hopefully he will give us a heads up on what coming.
  • Lisa Sebenick

    Hey Ken, I guess you know that our NKCA Youth Knife for 2007 was a GEC white bone handled trapper. Did you order one of those for your collection? If not, let me know and I think we have a few still available. Since they're more than a year old, any knive still available can be sold to NKCA members (not just youth members).
    Have a great day!
    Lisa
  • Gary Kennedy

    I love the quality of the knives but can GEC work on the nail nick a little bit I think Ive broke every nail I have . finally went to a knife opener .GREAT KNIFE

  • In Memoriam

    Scott King

    Got me a stag GE toenail in the mail yesterday from Blue Creek Cutlery for my EDC, well almost...
  • Roger Cunningham

    EDC?You may want to reinforce your pants pockets.
  • james childers

    hey gays and gals glad to be here great fan of GEC i started whith them in 06 i have a compleat set of 06s only two that i know about,any ways glad to be here
  • Roger Cunningham

    Toenail,I like it because it`s made like they were 75 years ago,and I`m also an antique toenail collector.
  • Ken Mundhenk

    I just spoke with Chris at Great Eastern, they have some new Great Eastern and Northfield knives coming out. She hopes she can post here today and tell us about them.

  • KnifeMaker

    Joan Mae Howard

    Hi all, in the next couple of days Great Eastern Cutlery will be producing the following knives: a #538308 Great Eastern (440C stainless steel blades) stockman in Red Stag, a #735109ECL Northfield (end cap single skinner blade with a liner lock) in Burnt Stag and a #231208 Great Eastern in American Elk.

  • KnifeMaker

    Joan Mae Howard

    My mistake, sorry, on the #23 Great Eastern American Elk the pattern number will be #235208 with the main blade being a drop point skinner. Sorry for the mis-info.

  • In Memoriam

    Anthony "Tank" Meeks

    Can't wait to see the 23 in Elk!
  • james childers

    here are the 2006 set
  • Ken Mundhenk

    Fine collection James, I don't have any from 06, did they put serial numbers on them in 06?
  • Ken Mundhenk

    I'm with ya, I'm sure they will be awesome. When Chris told me about them, I placed my order for my site.
  • james childers

    yes ken they had ser# any over runs did not have ser# they seam to be a bit more expensive,they only a few like that. i would to go back in records and look.
  • Ken Mundhenk

    Glad you have the 06 set, I bet there are alot of folks that wish they had started collecting GEC in the beginning. I'm one of them!
  • james childers

    here are some of my 2007s GECs
  • Bruce Piehl

    My faverite GEC is the Good `n Plenty 2007 Trapper. It looks great and opens left handed. It well be a long time before I give this one up!
  • Charles Ray Wagnor

    just looked on the web site and saw the 4 new ones wow, now if only I had some money LOL http://greateasterncutlery.net/gpage.html
  • Ken Mundhenk

    Glad you liked them, just added two more this evening. GEC is putting out some fantastic knives
  • Ken Mundhenk

    I haven't been very active here lately. We live in Shawnee State Forest in Southern Ohio. Last friday due to windy and dry conditions (with the help of a fire bug) Shawnee Forest had a 3,000 acre forest fire. On saturday we thought we were going to be evacuated. We contacted friends (Roger Cunningham, who happens to be our insurance agent) was more than eager to help us move if the need arose. Luckly we were spared. What a relief. Roger was jumping with joy. It was a long four days and nights. So now I can get active again on the site
  • Rusty R Halsey

    Glad you escaped the forest fire, Ken. That could have been bad!

  • In Memoriam

    Scott King

    yeah, Ken sorry I didn't respond. Glad all is OK. So you got Roger out of bed to come help you? :) just kidding.
    Glad to have you back. Hope you don't mind I added a vid to the main area of the GE Group
  • Roger Cunningham

    I was going to take care his knives for him.That`s all Ken was worried about.

  • In Memoriam

    Scott King

    Hey Ken
    How's that? Anything you'd like me to do with this video? I can take it down, if you'd like.
  • Ken Mundhenk

    Great Eastern Cutlery will be having their 3rd annual knife rendezvous(open house) July 23rd,24th and 25th at their plant inTitusville, PA I'll be posting lodging and other information as I get it. Roger Cunningham and myself along with our wives went last year. We had a great time. I'll keep you posted.

  • In Memoriam

    Scott King

    Ken
    Is that something you can post on the master community calendar?! :)
    Scott
  • Mike Bryant


    I am Lost on Great Eastern. I stole the pictures from ebay hoping some of you Collectors would know thw answer.

    This knife has the number 127 etched on the Bolster. The blade says 250 made. The seller of this knife said only 110 were made. Now the question. How can this be number 127 if only 110 were made in this Bone Jigging? What are they talking about is 127 the frame number?
  • Mike Bryant

    This is the Auction information that was posted with the knife below.
    Up for bid is a 2006 Great Eastern Cutlery Tidioute model #23 Pioneer with diamondback amber jigged bone handles. There were only 110 of this pattern made with this jigged bone in the innaugural year of this fine cutlery. This knife is serial #127 (250 total of this Tidioute pattern made, 110 in diamondback bone). It measures 4 1/2" closed, has flush nickel silver bolsters and pinned "Tidioute" shield, brass liners and pins, and 1095HC carbon steel blades, unused and unsharpened. Both blades have super strong half stops and excellent walk and talk. Any marks on the blades are simply from the factory oil, they're in pristine condition. The bone handles are in excellent condition, no chips or cracks, and done in GEC's own diamondback jigging. The knife has never been used and comes with original tube and wax paper wrap. This knife is one of the first knives made in GEC's first year of production, don't miss this opportunity to own a piece of history! If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

    Item Specifics

    Type : Folding Knife Brand: Great Eastern Cutlery

    Material : 1095HC Model: #23 Pioneer

    CLOSED LENGTH : 4 1/2" Style: Folding Trapper
  • Rusty R Halsey

    Made by GEC
    I'm still playing with referencing an ebay auction. Lets see if this works.
  • Rusty R Halsey

    OK, it worked! I'll get back to the ebay link in a second, but first I wanted to say I was watching the same 2006 GEC auction that Mike was asking about. All the different numbers for quantities had me confused also. Referencing the GEC 2006 Production Totals (this is cool!) only confused me more. They show a total of 200 #23 Tidoutes made, 110 of them in diamondback bone. There is something I'm not understanding here.

    This knife, although a prototype, is the same as referenced in a previous post. It is a Bulldog brand 3 blade trapper made by GEC. I respect GEC quality, like most Bulldog knives that are not celluloid, and love the 3 blade trapper design. But there is something about this knife that turns me off. In my opinion, it is an ugly knife. Seems to be selling ok though.
  • Mike Latham

    Well if they made 200(I don't find that number and expect it to be more like 210+), maybe the first 81 were Bocote; the next 19 were Chocolate Bone; the last 110 were Diamondback Bone. They didn't start the serial numbers over for each handle material.

    I didn't care for that 3Blade either, until I got it in-hand. Something about that expensive little beast...
  • Mike Bryant

    Hi Rusty. I am still confused. Rusty a question how do you tell a PROTOTYPE in GEC? Cool link you provided. I went back and added all the different shield varieties together and found GEC only showa a total Production of each of the shield types on the 23 Pattern at 244, 227, & 21o. I am still Corn-fused!!
  • Mike Latham

    Great Eastern branded (Northfield, Tidioute, Great Eastern) prototypes will have a large main blade etch "Prototype". The Bulldog branded variants are etched at the Bulldog shop and probably on the back of the main blade in a more subtle metal etching.

    Be careful unless you get prototypes of a variant that was never actually made at all; which is the true reason for prototypes (to pick on variant over another for final production). There is a large market for proto's and they are quite easy to counterfeit if the only difference is the etching....
  • Mike Bryant

    Hi Mike,

    OK, maybe you hit the numbering sequence on the head 210 made of the 23 pattern in the Tidioute Shield they had 3 digfferent Jigging patterns. Apparrently all the Spay blades were all etched before assembly and GEC had plans to manufacture 250 total knives but only wound up making 210 with this Shield? So were their 40 Prototyppes possibly made with the Tidioute Shield, Inquiring minds want to know?
    I got a feeling that collecting these GEC knives will be as much fun as collecting the CASE CLASSICS was when they were very affordable.
  • Mike Latham

    No, GEC will only make 2 protos of each variant and #1 goes into the company collection. I expect they used the remaining blades for the 2007/2006 transition River Valley Green Pioneer. That tang has both dates (they added the 2007). People will throw a fit if you go higher than your etched max production; few complain if you come in under advertised production totals.

  • KnifeMaker

    Joan Mae Howard

    It has been brought to my attention that our 2006 production numbers are not correct. I would like to explain the #23 Amber. My records show that we produced the following in numerical order for the #23 Tidioute: 001 - 136 - Diamond Back Amber, 137 - 189 - Bocote Wood, 190 - 199 - Diamond Back Amber, 200 - 205 - Bocote Wood, 206 - 208 - Diamond Back Amber, 209 - 230 - Bocote Wood, 231 - Diamond Back Amber, 232 - 250 Chocolate Jig bone. Hope that helps explain it somewhat.
  • Mike Latham

    Chris, that looks like French or something. Can you translate to english?

    I think you said 150 Amber, 81 Bocote, and 19 Chocolate; all but the Chocolate with varying number ranges...?

    In other words, stop trying to make sense out of 2006 serial numbers...
  • Richard L Campbell (Dick)

    Just purchased a Northfield #36 pattern and it looks great. I wonder if a three back spring lockback whittler is a possibility.
  • Mike Bryant

    Thanks Chris, I am glad the Ladies & Gentlemen from Great Eastern are members of this Club, Especially You! You had the records on hand to provide an answer to my question in an exceptionally quick time! :).

    I am sure sooner or later other questions will come up about Production Numbers and the relation to a particular number of a knife’s frame. It is great to know that You have records of the different handles and numbers sequence associated with the different Shields. Oh, and I didn’t have a hard time understanding what you were saying.

    At this time Counterfeiting is probably not a problem with GEC, however as time goes by and these early issues rise in value, then I would almost bet some enterprising Person will attempt to counterfeit the more valuable issues of your early cutlery. It’s great to know somebody can tell us if the knife is legit or not.

    I collected The Case Classics because the Quality of the knives, however the miss information on them was tremendous. Even the Case Classics Book that was published in 1995 had some typos in it. Hopefully when the GEC Book is published for GEC collectors your records will be a little more accurate.
  • Ken Mundhenk

    Great Eastern Cutlery will be conducting their annual "Open House" on July 23rd with tours of the factory 8A-2P, July 24th with tours of the factory, 8A-4p and July 25th with tours 8A-4P. Their address is: 701 Spring Street, Titusville, PA. Chris at GEC has provided the following lodging information:

    Comfort Inn - Titusville - 814-827-0041
    Cross Creek Resort - Titusville - 814-827-9611
    Arlington Hotel - Oil City - 814-677-1221
    Holiday Inn Express - Cranberry - 814-677-2640
    Quality Inn - Franklin - 814-437-3031

    Hope to see you there

  • In Memoriam

    Scott King

    Any Feedback from GE here on any new designs in the words yet to be announced?