Thread: Old Find During House Cleaning!

Hey, folks, brand new n00b to the fold. I've lurked for a couple of months, but decided I need to post something because of an old razor I found while cleaning house.

A few years ago, I was involved in a mail-in shooting match on another website themed after the Talvisolta Winter War (Finland vs. USSR, '39-40). Because of my placement in the rankings, I won this old razor. It's boxed in what appears to be ancient bonded leather. The box is stamped on the backside with "Fabrik Marke (or Marko, can't be terribly sure)" with a silhouette of two storks facing each other between the words. On the front of the box, near the opening is the stamp "Gegr. 1834" and the logo reads in large, cursive-like print "Robert Klaas" and under it in smaller cursive print "Solingen - Ohligs"

The razor itself has seen much better days. The only stamping on the narrow, hollow-ground blade is at the tang, just above the scales and it reads "Garantie Solingen" The metal is covered with a pretty thorough patina of rust and black. The scales themselves are very thin, and one of them has some deep scratching on the end, like it has been ground down.

Needless to say, it is not in good shape. However, I believe it to be either a war trophy from Talvisota or possibly issued to a Finnish soldier who served in that war.

Anyone have more information on this?

Pictures go ALONG way on something like this.

While rust and patina can be cleans off, depending on many factors it may be a lost cause or just a simple touch up.

Tracing it to a war time event would be pretty darn hard to prove, short of having some special issue markings. Again, pics would help tremendously...

Welcome to the site

Welcome to SRP. Robert Klaas was, maybe is, a company that goes back to the 1700s or something like that. Made all kinds of cutlery including swords and such for the military. They are also well thought of among pocket knife collectors for their vintage blades and known as "Kissing Cranes". Whether your razor could be restored to shaving is unclear without photos.

Edit; if the razor doesn't have "Kissing Cranes" or the logo with the two cranes on it than it may be mismatched to the box.

Wow Jimmy, that "Kissing Crane" reference just bought back a blast from the past for me. Until reading your post, I hadn't heard that name in many years.

Many years ago when I was going to school in rural Mississippi, boys openly carried and traded pocket knives, and nobody gave it a second thought. Between classes, one of the trading games that we'd play was called "knife dropping." The way it worked was that each kid had a folding pocket knife hidden in his hand, and we'd randomly pair up at a table. On a count of three, we'd each drop the knife in our hand on the table, executing a sight-unseen "trade" with the kid directly across from us. Kind of like a grab bag at Christmas, with pocket knives. If you got stuck with junk, you'd unload it at the next knife drop and maybe get something better. Holding out on quality pieces was the mark of a coward.

This was before imported junk was common. Vintage Case, Buck, and Schrade were common stuff. Anything marked Solingen was prized. The two brands I remember being especially highly prized were "German Eye" and "Kissing Crane". I snagged a Kissing Crane at one knife drop, and it was the best pocket knife I ever had. Cleaned many a squirrel with it during squirrel season, it really took and held an edge.

Pardon the detour, but I figure that any razor from the same maker as Kissing Crane is as good as that knife, and that would be good indeed. My first straight was a Dovo, because all I knew at the time was that anything steel made in Solingen didn't suck.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Welcome to SRP. Robert Klaas was, maybe is, a company that goes back to the 1700s or something like that. Made all kinds of cutlery including swords and such for the military. They are also well thought of among pocket knife collectors for their vintage blades and known as "Kissing Cranes". Whether your razor could be restored to shaving is unclear without photos.

Edit; if the razor doesn't have "Kissing Cranes" or the logo with the two cranes on it than it may be mismatched to the box.

Ah yes, "Kissing Cranes" I was trying to remember that because I have seen the logo before. Haven't had the opportunity to own one yet.

yeah, plenty of these made, so it's not really a rarity. could be connected to the war, some people used straight razors back then, but it's probably impossible to prove it anymore, if you don't have the proof already.

Fatboy Slim, that's a great story!

Good luck to the original poster--I hope you can clean it up and shave with it.

Hi SonOf1337,

Welcome to the site.
I have no specific info on your razor in general, but of course it is likely that men during winter war shaved with whatever they had (whenever there was time & warm enough to shave). My father-in-law used his Gillette DE on his winter war times. For the rest of my family members who fought in winter war it was probably the same, sadly i never came to ask. Army never issued razors to soldiers, they had to bring their own. Same way still today.
However would be nice to see pics of your razor.

Thanks a lot to all you folks for the responses. I will try to upload pics of the razor and box sometime this weekent, but time's tight. We'll have to play it by ear.

The blade doesn't have the Kissing Cranes logo on it anywhere that I've been able to see. The only stamping that has survived the years is the "GARANTIE SOLINGEN" stamped on the side of the tang just above the swivel. This razor is ancient and pretty misshapen from years and years of use. If anyone ever took the time to straighten the edge back out, it would probably shorten the blade profile to something like a 3/8 or maybe even a 5/16 (REALLY narrow). Also, I'd have to completely sand and restore the metal, replace the scales, and spend a WHOLE lot of time on a hone. I was just wondering how common/rare these things were.

Currently, I'm working on the edge of a Marbles Damascus I bought in Branson. Yeah, yeah, I know they're junk. I figure I'll have to put it on the mantle for looks and see if I can scare up a good vintage for actual use.

Thanks again for the welcome and thanks for the answers. I'll get the photos up as soon as I can.

Still no pictures?!

C'mon dude! lol