Book Review: W.R. Case & Sons Cutlery Company

Because of our (and our fathers’) appreciation for Case pocket knives, we were happy to check out the new book in the Images of America series, W.R. Case & Sons Cutlery Company. We hoped for more details about the knives, but the book is mostly a Case family photo album with captions and commentary provided by two long-time Case employees. It documents the achievements of the entrepeneurs, craftsmen, and businessmen and women who comprised the Case family “dynasty” over the last hundred years.

It does offer, however, some cool photographs of hafters, cutlers, and grinders at work, as well as the machinery involved, such as a steel-hardening furnace, a razor forge, grease-buffer wheels, polishing wheels, and a logo-stamping press. Some photographic highlights: Neil Armstrong with a commemorative Astronaut’s knife, a letter from Case collector President Ronald Reagan thanking a sales rep for sending him a knife to add to his collection, and the six-foot long giant model of a Case Kodiak that was stolen from a company display in the 1980s and turned up stuck in somebody’s back yard several miles away.

Though the emphasis of the book is on the people of Case, you’ll find plenty of extras; the photos of the evolution of Case knives from 1905 (when the company took root in Bradford, PA) to the present is a worthwhile addition to the bookshelf.

Boser, Shirley, and John Sullivan. Images of America: W.R. Case & Sons Cutlery Company. Charleston, SC: Arcadia, 2006. Paperback. ISBN:0-7385-3937-6

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