Thread: Huge vintage straight razor lot

Originally Posted by Voidmonster

I’d guess the whole set was a barber’s, likely early 1900’s — that stropper gizmo was for early disposable blades.

The bigguns are late 1800’s, maybe early 1900’s. They’re legit huge. Unusually so.

The current best guess is that razors like that were genuinely aimed at barbers (see all the For Barber’s Use variants) because being super large they could be repeatedly reground and thus would have longer life when they got used over and over again every day.

There are at least two other distinct styles of huge razors.

One, the display razor, were never meant to be used (and I’m not even sure they can be), but they’re also completely brobdingnagian. Multiple feet long.

The other were ... something else. All the examples I’ve seen are from the first couple decades of 1800. They are like a normal 8/8 or so, but scaled up 20-30% in all regards. The blades aren’t just wider, they’re longer as well and some even have larger assembly hardware on the scales.




(Scale on that is metric)

There were also similarly ‘scaled up’ smaller razors. So, like a 6/8 blade shape scaled up until it’s 8/8ish.



(Those are both just shy of 8/8)

I really like the 2nd razor.

Originally Posted by randydance062449

I really like the 2nd razor.

It’s an absurd beast of a thing. Never seen another from the maker.

Since people are asking to see detail shots of the items from the lot I will continue to slowly unbox them. It's alittle annoying cause each item is wrapped in about 3 feet of newspaper. The next item up is displayed in detail here.

Thanks

Cheetah

This is one of the smaller razors from the lot that I won recently. You can find the detailed thread here.

Best efforts to describe it:

15/16 George Wostenholm & Sons Celebrated I * XL Wedge Razor w/ Barbers Notch & engraved scales. Since the stamp reads "& Sons" and the place of manufacture is Washington Works, Sheffield the earliest that this razor could have been made is around 1847.

Overall, for its age, the razor is in good condition. No hone wear. No signs of active rust but there is a heavy patina that covers the blade totally. As well as some dark devil's spit on the back face of the blade.

Thanks

Cheetah

Every newbie should be required to find and buy a huge lot like this...LOL. This lot has everything you need to get started. There have been some gems that come to light and this is one of them.

A little history in a 125 page book. Of course it's out of date when it comes to the pricing section but the knowledge gained is amazing. Great for train rides to and from work.

A few more pages found Here


Thanks

Cheetah