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Hi all
I recently won this razor on the Bay
Attachment 77527
As I understand it, Case stopped making razors in 1962 there is no way this razor is 49 years old, the box is mint as is the razor and there was still a thin lacquer coat on the blade for (I assume) protection, the engraving looks laser cut to me.
can anyone shed some light on when this might have been made?
Many thanks
There is an interesting bit of history here. Some time ago I wrote an article about it, some of which is included here....
In the 1980s Case were making losses, and quality was on the decline, and the company was placed on the market in 1988. It was purchased by Parker, and then in 1990 by River Associates, who owned it for a couple of years before it was acquired by Zippo. Some would say that the "dark period" for Case ended when Zippo turned round its fortunes. Others would maintain that the dark period ended with the purchase of Case by Parker, but in reality, Parker was never really able to take the company forwards in the way that Zippo did.
Parker's dream: "The biggest reason for the Case Classics was my love for fine quality knives". "I wanted everyone to be able to own and enjoy a superior knife hand crafted in the old way; beautiful handle material and high Carbon steel blades that would take and hold a razor edge".
Actually, in reality, his project failed, because a) there were not enough people (the market) who shared his dream, and b) he did not have them made "in house", employing the same craftsmen who could actually do it, and the quality was lower than the old knives. Why do you think Zippo's first move was to re-employ the old craftsmen?
When Parker owned Case (for only two years between 1988 and 1990), he also acquired the old Case family brands trade marks of Crandall and J D C Kane, and he continued to have knives made under these trade marks well after Zippo took over W.R.Case & Sons. (Parker held onto the trade names!) Case subsequently purchased back these trade marks, and have begun to use them again.
So, in a nutshell, your razor was made between 1988 and 1990 by Parker, when he owned the brand name W R Case & Sons. But the razors and knives that were made during his ownership were not actually made in Bradford PA in the Case factory. Manufacturing was outsourced to Queen Cutlery and Solingen Germany, where your razor was made.
Rod
PS. It is possible that you bought the razor on Ebay from Parker's son!
The family stashed away a huge quantity of knives etc. from the Parker period, and he has been steadily selling them off for several years. Your razor is "brand new" unused.
PPS. The blade isn't laser etched. It is acid etched.
Great info Neep.I have several N.O.S case razors,how can you tell if made by parker.
Mine have real Mother of pearl scales,odiousley heavy razors.
'Tis easy to tell. The Parker "Case" razors were made in Solingen.Quote:
Originally Posted by pixelfixed
W R Case & Sons made razors in Bradford PA. Always.
In the case of the razor above it is easy, because of the box.
BUT:
Parker was a bit naughty with knives made in Germany though. He had them marked "USA", by using the "Case family brands" trade marks. e.g. a knife marked "Kane Bradford PA USA" was actually made in Germany, without stating the country of manufacture. (Which is actually a legal requirement). He did the same with many of the "Case XX Classics" knives, although some of those were made in the USA by Queen Cutlery.
I wonder if Odset's new razor has "Germany" anywhere on the blade or tang?
Because that's where it was made. :hmmm:
Rod
Thanks for the insight Neep, so it's N.O.S I am still a reasonably happy bunny though! The guy I bought the razor from had about eight different razors at auction on the same day with very close end times, all were worth a punt I kept going back to the Case for some reason maybe I was meant to have it!
If I had seen it I would have bid on it too :)
One very good thing about the Parker "Case" knives and razors made in Germany is the Solingen carbon steel. Much better at taking an edge. (By that period W R Case & Sons had moved over almost entirely to stainless steel knives).
By the way, if you ever see a "Bulldog" brand knife or razor, then they were made in the same factory in Solingen too. By Parker.
Rod
Great Info Rod, Turns out I have 5 case blades,two NOS MOP,boxes are marked solingen, only markings on the tangs and blades are:WR case and sons cutlery co.Tested XX stainless, same on one I have in Staghorn.
as a side note, one has inner and outer boxes with all paperwork (soligen blade) stating assembled in the U.S.
Also have two Bluepoints from Bradford,do you know what timeframe they might be from?.
I am not sure about your Bluepoints.
My expertise is in Case knives really. With the knives it is easy to date them pretty accurately due to the style of the "Case" name branding, and later, (too late for razors) they introduced a tiny punched "dot" system for each year in conjunction with different styles of lettering. (10 dots down to 1 dot)
I haven't handled any of the Case razors, so I would like to see a close up of the tang stamps to see if they conform with the same dating scheme as the knives.
Cheers
Rod
No Dots on any of them,on closer inspection in very tiny script the tangs on the soligen blades do say Germany.
Hi mate, if you look at my photo next to W R Case & Sons Cutlery Co on the tang, there are what look like two vertical dark lines, when viewed through a loupe they spell out Solingen Germany other than that and the engraving on the blade there is nothing, no dot system.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neep
Cheers
John
There we are then.
There is a way to identify the Parker "Case" razors.
Any made in Soligen will definitely be Parker era razors (1988-1990)
Rod
Acording to Rich Kupillas who wrote a section on Case Razors in the 5th Ed. of Knives & Razors by Jim Sargent.
Case had razors made in Germany between the Wars. Quote by Rich " W. R. Case and Sons, Germany( 1920-1940)
"Thease razors were made to look just like Case razors of the period. The tang reads " Made by Solingin Germany Experts" (on the mark side). " This is the second German invasion, which came sometime between 1920 and the start of WWII. Though they are not quite as rare as the early German razor, they are still very hard to find." page 316.
From page 310. W.R. Case and Sons( made in Germany)(1905-1915). "Razors having this German stamp were imported for a short period of time somewhere between 1905 and the start of WWI. All have the backs of the blades worked in a floral pattern, with W.R. Case and Sons etched on them, Handles are of various colored celluloids, molded in the Classic pattern. As the war grew more and more imminent with Germany, many of these razors were imported without"Germany" stamped on the tang, and some have no marking at all except the blade etching"
As for the Parker period at Case, I understand he "looted" the factory museum and sold them off. Of course, he owned the company. If you are interested on detailed thoughts on Parker just search his name in Levine's group on Bladeforums.com.
More info concerning Case. Not to get into an arguement with our friend in the UK(Neep) but he said "but So, in a nutshell, your razor was made between 1988 and 1990 by Parker, when he owned the brand name W R Case & Sons. But the razors and knives that were made during his ownership were not actually made in Bradford PA in the Case factory. Manufacturing was outsourced to Queen Cutlery and Solingen Germany, where your razor was made."
This is not correct. I own a Case German razor the paperwork in the box is dated 2001. So these razors were made after that. I Own one in the exact box with same blade etch only it is Item 20979 and description RAZ 415715SS and it is Chestnut Bone and it was packaged April 14, 2003 as per the bar code on the box.
In addition to the Queen Reference, I doubt that. The razor is still wrapped in DOVO paper inside the box, thus, more likely made by Dovo. I doubt that Case would have to go via Queen to get DOVO to make razors.
So in a different nut shell, these Case razors were made no earlier than 2001, were most likely made by Dovo and during the ZIPPO ownership of Case.
So, what you have is a razor made by Parker, in Solingen, but using one of the W R Case trademarks which he didn't sell on when he sold the company. Really! It is not a pukka company made "W R Case & Sons" razor!Quote:
Originally Posted by redrover66
Aplogies for my (sort of) misleading comment. I should have been more specific. Parker had knives made by Queen. Not razors.Quote:
In addition to the Queen Reference, I doubt that. The razor is still wrapped in DOVO paper inside the box, thus, more likely made by Dovo. I doubt that Case would have to go via Queen to get DOVO to make razors.
Yes.... but... :DQuote:
So in a different nut shell, these Case razors were made no earlier than 2001, were most likely made by Dovo and during the ZIPPO ownership of Case.
By that time Zippo owned Case, but NOT all of the trademarks! That was the whole point of what I wrote above. Parker was naughty and hung on to those trademarks when he sold the company in 1990. Hence Parker was able to make knives and razors bearing some of the trademarked names. But really, they were nothing to do with the Case company (owned by Zippo). What I didn't know, is that Parker was still producing razors as late as 2002 with the W R Case & Sons trademarks, as he was with pen knives. But it doesn't surprise me.
There was a LOT of legal fuss about the whole thing at the time, and the trademarks were eventually sold to Case (Zippo).
Rod
So the fact that within the sealed outer box the razor box was shipped in is W.R. Case & Sons paper work(dated 2001) with info on the codes to their Case German product and how to read pocket knife codes made in Germany and a form to join the Case Collectors Club. And the paper work is copyrighted by W.R. Case and Sons. So in you opinion Parker via Parker Knife Collector Services made these razors, wrapped them in Dovo paper, placed them in W. R. Case & Son's Boxes, placed those boxes which were sealed with a bar code using Case ID, RAZ 415715 SS and sold them as Parker products. I realize that Parker owned a bunch of trademarks that he kept up to some point but I find it hard to believe that he was able to sell razors in Boxes marked W.R. Case & Sons, a brand, I believe became Zippo's at the time of purchase in 1993.
I have a question for Neep:
Recently, I bought a couple "W.R. Case and Sons, Bradford, PA" razors on Ebay.
One is a "Bulls Eye" razor that says "Made by Solingen Germany Experts."
The other is a "Real Red Point" razor that features the Real Red Point ornamental circle on the handle — but there is no red within the circle.
What do you think about those two razors?
Neep made that post in 2011. His most recent post was in September of 2013. You might send a private message to him and see if he is still receiving and answering such. As far as the razors, IIRC when Case was still family owned they had some razors made in Solingen. Whether yours would be from the Parker era, or from the family, I wouldn't know how to tell. If you posted photos showing the tang stamps, and the scales someone might come along who could say for sure. :gl:Quote:
Originally Posted by kmadden
What can one tell about a W.R. Case and Sons razor if you see "Kunstschliff" stamped on the tang?
More than likely that is the name of a retailer as in a hardware concern or barber supplier.Quote:
Originally Posted by kmadden
A photo may shed some light?
Attachment 261986/Users/kevinmadden/Desktop/1.jpg
/Users/kevinmadden/Desktop/1.jpg
Interesting! Kunstschliff may have been a steel producer. Seems it is to advertise a 'voltage tempered' steel?Quote:
Originally Posted by kmadden
I have seen many makers from early to late advertise the steel in their blades on the tangs and even blade-face.
I suppose it also may be a 'giveaway' razor the company commissioned Case to stamp in order to simply advertise their steel?
A quick google search yielded nothing on them for me, aside from razors such as this.
I realize that I am responding to an old post, but I wanted to clarify some things and add some information.
As a few of you here know I work for WR Case Cutlery and have access to the Case Historian (Katie) as well as some records still in the system. Katie and I have done some research and we were unable to find any information or evidence that Parker produced or had someone else produce straight razors marked with the Case name during or after he owned the company. I cannot say with 100% certainty that he did not have any made, I can only state that we were unable to find anything saying he did.
What we do know for sure is that the razor in the original post is definitely from 2001 (more than a decade after Parker) and was part of a marketing project based on WR Cases history with German cutleries. See the picture below titled “Shadows of the Past: Case and Germany Reunited”. I have also seen and read through the original project meeting notes for these razors. Many of the people in those meeting are still with the company and I have spoken to a few of them to confirm details.
Some additional info: There was also a Leather Strop offered in 2001. In 2002 there was 1 razor offered to Case Collectors Club members as a Fathers Day offer (Gold inlaid etching on blade). In 2003 there were 3 additional razors offered. All these razors from 2001 – 2003 were produced by Dovo (Soligen, Germany) with WR Cases name on them for WR Case.
Below is production information that was copied and pasted from an email the Historian sent me:
“For all of these items, we advertised a limited production run of “about 500” although we were under on most, but went slightly over on some.
In 2001 we came out with these:
.
Item # - Description - Quantity
20971 – Mother-of-Pearl - 478
20972 – Smooth Grey Bone - 450
20973 – Smooth Green Bone - 350
20974 – Smooth Red Bone - 350
20975 – Smooth Black Plastic with the Case Logo on the handle - 553
20976 – Smooth “Blonde” Plastic with the Case Logo on the handle - 552
We also did a Razor Strop:
Item # Description
20977 – Leather Razor Strop - 550
In 2003 we came out with these:
Item # - Description - Quantity
20978 – Smooth Tortoise Celluloid - 543
20979 – Jigged Chestnut Bone - 416
20980 – Jigged Green Bone - 480
We did another at some point for the CCC, but I will have to look for that item later…I’m late for a meeting."
One other interesting thing to note was that only the Black Plastic and Blond Plastic scale models from 2001were Carbon Steel, all other models were Stainless Steel and were marked with “Tested XX Stainless” on the back of the tang. The Carbon models have a single shoulder while the Stainless models have a double shoulder.
Just wanted to make this post to share the info I have found as I have seen incorrect information on these razors in multiple places on the web.
I have a 2003 Jigged Chestnut Bone and a 2003 Smooth Tortoise model as well as a couple of unscaled blades if anyone wants to see more pictures.
Excellent info! Thanks! :bow
Quote:
Originally Posted by kmadden
The literal translation of "Kunstschliff" from German to English is "Art Cut". What that means in relation to a straight razor is beyond me but it sure do sound fancy.
Bob
Item 20971 appears to be the same as a Dovo 41 I have. It is stainless steel with real one piece MOP scales. Real one piece MOP scales from Dovo have not been nade for quite a while.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fenster
Bob
So interesting to be able to hear the facts provided by folks who have access to original sources of information. Thank you.
that does not surprise me, while I certainly have no insider knowledge of Dovo's inventory or its supply chain, I can tell you that it has been increasingly harder and harder to source production quantities of larger size slabs of pearl over the last few years.Quote:
Originally Posted by BobH
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fenster
I emailed Dovo Germany about their one piece MOP scales and was told they cannot source large enough pieces anymore and now use faux pearl material for their scales. It has to do with certain areas that did produce large shells being placed in a protected state allowing no harvesting.
Bob
Yep, and the places that are farming the shell don't get the big ones or don't wait long enough for them to get big.
At least that is what I was told at work.
