What is the barber's notch for?

**mackie** · 12-28-2009, 04:25 AM

I was told by a friend who is a barber, that when the civil war was over, so many men came home with one arm that it was started for them, so they could open the razor with one hand by hooking it on the wash stand.

**mrsell63** · 12-28-2009, 05:20 AM

Mackie seems to have a handle on it. The notch is basically for opening the blade. Barbers used their razors so often in any given day that the finger placed in the notch facilitated opening the blade. It is basically for convenience and the notch certainly fits the fingertip and vice versa. Please don't sharpen it to shave your nostril post!!!

I'm glad they don't make a switchblade razor. What a facilitator that would be!!!!!!

Jerry
~~~

**Allen** · 12-28-2009, 06:06 AM

+1 on ease of opening. That's what I've been told, as well.

**IanS** · 12-28-2009, 08:35 AM

+1 to mackie's reason.

**xman** · 12-28-2009, 08:47 AM

Originally Posted by kcarlisle

the barber's notch is for. ...

Arguing about.

**gssixgun** · 12-28-2009, 05:13 PM

I always love these threads when they come up, we get some imaginative stories and theories out of them... Unfortunately as of now there just is no definitive answer...

When I draw a blank on research, I always go back to look at the razors...
If you start back in the 1700's you can see the emergence of the "notch" from a simple C clipped out of the toe, as it then became more defined through the 1800's then ended in the early 1900's....

Personally I think just plain old aesthetics might be all it was... but maybe someday we might find if there was a true reason for it...