Thread: Challenge Razor

So I went to an antique store while on a road trip and saw this guy had a box of knives and razors for 15 a pop. I would have bought more than one but the wife was there giving me that look. I was wondering about the dates on it. It has no "made in" markings or anything like that. It just has the word "challenge" on one side of the tang and quite ornately I must say, and a rifle on the other side. The scales are black plastic I believe and the blade is a square point. It seems as though it was never really used as the hone wear is almost non-existent. It's a 6/8 too. I will try to get pictures up as soon as I can. Unfortunately its a new camera and a computer that I am not familiar with that is keeping me from being able to upload the pictures.

I''d like to see pictures of this, is it maybe a "rifle steel" razor? Post ASAP.

So heres the photos. Excuse the doubles and the fact that there are only two photos. I am using a new camera that I haven't quite figured out and everytime I tried to upload the photos SRP wouldn't let me.

Originally Posted by stimpy52

I''d like to see pictures of this, is it maybe a "rifle steel" razor? Post ASAP.

It's funny that you say "rifle steel" because I was thinking that it smelled like a rifle or gun barrel. Then I dismissed it as just being in my head because I figured that while all steel is not the same there can't be huge differences in smells. But now that you say that it makes me wonder.

All old oiled-up razors smell like old rifles!
So Challenge Razor Co was changed to Challenge Cutlery in 1899. Since it says Challenge only, I think this one is from 20's to 30's or so. The scales seem to be celluloid.
Nice!

Originally Posted by sharptonn

All old oiled-up razors smell like old rifles!
So Challenge Razor Co was changed to Challenge Cutlery in 1899. Since it says Challenge only, I think this one is from 20's to 30's or so. The scales seem to be celluloid.
Nice!

I was thinking in the 20's at first because I read on i think strazors.com (i think that is the site name) they said that challenge went up for sale in 1926 and by 28 they were no more. Then I was thinking it was older than the 20's because again I thought I read on another thread here that by the 20's a "made in" stamp was required. But thats just going off of memory and I am prone to being wrong by memory.

Either way it hones up really nice and I am just waiting till tuesday to shave so I have a nice 3 day growth and see what its capable of.

Never mind I just saw that country of origin labeling or COOL was required beginning in 1930 so it most likely is a 1920's razor.