Thread: Discovered a bunch of old family shaving stuff; identification?

Recently, my grandmother was moving...in the move, she went through everything in her attic, and found a bunch of stuff that had belonged to her grandfather. I don't know much about this stuff, but I can tell you the information she gave to me, which may or may not be correct.
She claims most of this stuff was at least a few decades old when she was born (in 1945). She claims the handle on the razor is some sort of horn (it looks like bakelite to me but I'm hardly an expert. Here are the pictures of the stuff, along with a strop that belonged to the same man but had been sitting in my grandfather's bathroom for 40 years until about 6 months ago. Any sort of information on age, materials, manufacturer, and particularly what part of the sharpening process to use the stones in would be helpful.

The razor-box appears to be some sort of very stiff leather, and those insets look like mother-of-pearl. I've translated the card for the Rich-Con stone, if anybody need to know.

The writing, if you can't read it, says "Clauss", then "FREMONT, O" below that.

It's hard to see, but in the pictures below, I'm trying to show something odd about the razor's condition...much of the razor has a mirror shine to it, but there are big swaths of heavy tarnish (though not exactly rust) on it, particularly on one side. Perhaps the oil ran over time, and the Gulf Coast air got to the rest of it? It still seems a little specific.

I bet if you gave that Clauss a few passes on the Rich-Con barber hone and then gave it a good stropping, you could get a reasonable shave right now. Thats a good find.

Nice find. I would not recommend the Carborundum stone on a razor, as it is an oil stone and is likely to be rather coarse, but the Rich-Con should work great.

The Clauss should be a great shaver even with it's replacement scales.

Awesome Find!
i hope you can get it shave ready!

Clauss razors are fine shavers-nice find! With very little cleaning and honing, it could soon be shave ready. About the strop: the leather looks good, maybe needs only a little Neats Foot oil and rubbing. The other side of the strop looks like another Koken strop I have; is it blue and does it say it is impregnated with carborundum? That is actually a hone, if so, and removes lots of metal from the razor. I would not use that side, since you have a nice barber hone, IMO.

im jealous. nobody in my family thought to keep any of this kinda stuff around

If my grandparent were still around I'd be poking through their attic after looking at this. Good find!

Very good find. That all appears to be in good condition overall. I would be very excited if I were you! I agree, with some mild clean up of the blade, some neatsfoot oil rubbed into the strop, and a good 5-6 passes on the barbers hone and some stropping should get her shave ready. Just remember not to use the strop after applying the oil for about 24 hrs to let it absorb and become softer again. Good luck!

Wow, what a great piece of family history. Let us know how it shaves.

Well thank you all for the information, but I already know how to use the things, I was hoping for more historical information on them, when they were made, any interesting qualities they have.
The strop I'm not really using...it's got a big gash in it, about halfway done and about 2/5 of the way through to the middle. I'd rather not put the strop under the tension needed to use it because I'm afraid it will make the gash wider.
The barber's hone has been just great, it gave my Wapi and DOVO a much better edge than they had coming straight off the Norton 8k. It's also nice and compact, I'll be packing it instead of my Norton to take with me this summer to Germany & Vermont.
How much should I expect someone here to charge me to restore the razor? I'd basically like it full-polished, honed, re-pinned, and re-wedged.
On an interesting note, I just realized that the keyboard you can see in that picture, is sort of the straight razor of the keyboarding world...it's a pre-'92 IBM Model M. It's built to LAST, and LAST (the first models were made in 1986 and people are still pounding away on them today), most people find they type much better on them due to the superior well-engineered mechanism, and they've largely been replaced by cheap, low-quality keyboards to lower the advertised price of a packaged computer set.

P.S. Forgot to mention - so from what I've gathered, the Carborundum is much coarser than a Norton 4k? It would therefore be used to re-bevel a razor with a heavily damaged edge, correct?

P.P.S. A correction - these did not belong to my great-great-grandfather, they belonged to my great-great-great-grandfather.