THE POINT OF A GOOD KNIFE
or Any Southern man worth his salt should carry a blade
by Rick Bragg
One of these days, the last old man seated in the shade of the last country store on this earth will rummage around in the pocket of his frayed, baggy overalls and come out with a plug of Bloodhound, or Days Work, or Brown Mule. He will not bite off a chew, for he is not a Philistine. He will rummage again, this time coming out with a bone-handled pocketknife of no more than three and no less than two blades, all so sharp he could shave a cat if he could get it to stand still, and cut off a chew. He will hold the knife a little longer than he needs to, run his thumb along the edge, maybe even open and close it a few times, one-handed, the way he saw the old men do it when he was a boy, sitting in this same shade, listening to them dog cuss Herbert Hoover. Finally, he will snap it closed with that sharp click, with that sure, final sound a good knife has, and put it away for the last time.
Think, for just a moment, about your grandfather. He would have no more left the house without a pocketknife than without his breeches, for while a man of his era could survive this drafty world without pantaloons, he would sooner or later need to snip some twine, or punch a hole in an oil can, or dig a pine splinter out of some urchin’s foot, or just slice an apple. One of these days, men will no longer love or need their pocketknives this way. That is when we know the last Southern man has shuffled off into the sunset, to make room for a world of helpless no-accounts.
I will never forget my first one. I would like to pretend it was a gleaming heirloom, handed down from the Yankee war, but it was just a busted, rusted wreck, with one-and-a-half blades, tossed into the bottom of a toolbox, forgotten. A single-bladed knife was useless; if it broke, you were helpless. Any more than three blades and you were a Swiss Boy Scout. This one, I reasoned, would have to do till I was rich and could afford a good knife, like a Case. I was maybe 7 years old, but I put it in the pocket of my cutoff jeans and became, in that instant, a serious man. It was a German-made knife, its remaining blade and a half notched and pitted, but I was careless with it and it drew blood. Them German-mades sure hold an edge, the old men said when I showed them my sliced thumb, and told me my wound would most likely not be fatal, unless it got rust in it. I waited to die for much of 1966.
A Southern man, knifeless, was pitiful. Men without knives were like men who rode around without a jack, or a spare tire, just generally unprepared for life. A man could not fish, hunt, or work at any respectable employment. I am a writer, which is one step up from helpless, but I have always had a pocketknife. I believe, foolishly, it holds me close to my people.
In my hometown, some older gentlemen gather in the Huddle House to drink coffee and talk about the world as they know it. Not long ago, one of them walked over to my table and told me he enjoyed my stories about our world, and gave me a small, heavy box. Inside, wrapped in honest, oiled paper, was a perfect, three-bladed, bone-handled knife. It was a Case, a serious man’s knife. I went in search of something to cut, and, this time, it was not me.
PEGGY’S THOUGHTFUL THINKIN’S and REMEMBERIN’S on FIRST KNIVES
As soon as I read the first paragraph I instantly was reminded of my great grandad McCoy, my Dad’s McCoy uncles at Somerset-Lytle, and most any of the guys I saw my Dad talking to or visiting with from his work at the Post Office Garage. They all,…even some of the women for that matter, and a few of their kids, carried those small useful, utility knives, the pocketknife. One could clean fingernails, clean old tobacco out of their pipe’s bowl, cut twine and small rope, cut burrs out of a tangle of dog hair or clean a horse’s hoof, then cut an apple or iced down sandia (watermelon).
Back in the early 1950s, (OK. I was born in the mid 1940s) before all this modern politically incorrect knife carrying stuff, I had my first real knife. Hmm, to be perfectly honest, at age 3-4, I DID have access to Mom’s sterling silver dinner collection**. When she wasn’t looking those sterling dinner knives and soup spoons made excellent digging tools. They also caused a hand print or two on my britches when mom found them somewhere…outside…in the yard where I had been working hard to dig a beautiful hole, make mud pies (I still remember their taste and smell today)…or something else.
Mom had difficult time understanding me as I explained just how perfect her sterling silver dinner knives were for digging perfect holes in the dirt, making those mud pies in my new toy stove, or digging up our garden’s carrots and radishes and replanting them after finding they were not big enough for harvest, even following a ground squirrel hole or two deeper to see if the squirrel was home, even starting a water well (this was the late 40’s-early 50s drought, after all). That all changed when Dad brought home some real digging implements: my Captain Matheny Collection.
Now, Dad was a garageman/mechanic for the United States Post Office Garage. One of the other garagemen, Stanley Wall, worked on cars at his house in Alamo Heights as a side job. One of Stanley’s friends was San Antonio Police Department’s Juvenile Division Captain Matheny. Capt. Matheny collected hundreds, likely thousands, of switchblade knives along with zipguns from the JDs (juvenile delinquents) he arrested at some gang fight or street race…and fight.
When we’d visit Stanley I noticed these boxes of dozens of colorful knives near his work bench. I asked dad what they were and Dad replied that they were Stanley’s work knives. He broke the points off of and used them to scrape gaskets or gunky stuff off the engines he was rebuilding or just working on. Stanley also showed me what he was doing with them and sent Dad home with a cigar box full of these for me and my ;younger brother Mike. Baby brother Tim was just born so he wasn’t interested.
Dad kept that Roi Tan cigar box of switchblade knives with his tool box and let Mike and me have one each. I think Mike took a solid yellow one, but one of the red and yellow striped ones was perfect for me. I found it could outdo that ol’ sterling silver dinner knife. Now I had a real knife I could whittle with or help Dad make a fire for hot dogs. My new knife could shave off larger sticks or the shaggy cedar tree bark for kindlin for that fire, or make hot dog or marsh mellow cookin’ sticks. And, when I was trying to become an Indian, I found I could fashion a real “Comanche” bow and arrows (to shoot at Mike, I never hit him, but I don’t think Mom ever saw, at least she never caught me) and to dig seriously in the dirt with. There was always a need for a good hole in the ground. I had some big concerns: If the ground squirrel wasn’t home, it had to be checked to see if there was potential for water that we needed, or could it be a baby volcano? No Parícutin volcano was going to sprout in my yard like it did in that Mexican farmer’s field. Ah, the worries of 5-6 year old.
I had my knife for years and learned more responsible ways to use it and never take it to school. I also learned how to sharpen it on dad’s whetstone. When good hot dog sticks needed to be cut and sharpened, I was ready. I had grown past digging for water wells and checking any potential volcano in the yard, and Mike no longer was a target for my arrows. I don’t recall any serious cuts. None that Mom ever doctored anyway.
AND THAT ** (in Peggy’s 2nd paragraph)? HERE’S THE REST OF THAT STORY
A few years before Mom and Dad passed away, we were cleaning and straightening the drawers with table settings, serving pieces …. and lots of stainless steel. I asked her where the old sterling silver place settings for six were. “They’re wrapped up and in a sack in my closet. Since we usually have 12 to 40 any time we get together, six place settings just don’t work like they did when there was just Jesse and Me (June) and you three kids,” Mom replied.
“When and where did you get them?” I asked, ” I’ve never seen that pattern in the stores.” Mom said when Dad returned home upon his discharge from the U. S. Navy in 1945, she and Dad were in the process of moving her out of her mom’s (my grandmother’s) home to their new home when a salesman stopped by grandma’s house. (NOTE #1: It was no secret that Grandmother did not like her son-in-law as he was NOT a college man, but someone from a “poor” country farm. NOTE #2: Grandmother was raised on a farm in Nebraska (go figure) went to University of Nebraska and was one of the first women to graduate with a Bachelor’s Degree in Home Economics from the new College of Agriculture. She even taught at the U of N’s College of Ag for 4 years after graduation.) OK, now, the rest of the story.
This Fine Arts Sterling salesman was selling sterling silver dinnerware: knives, dinner forks, salad forks, teaspoons, soup spoons and a butter spreader. Grandmother was ready to order some place settings for her other daughter, who had just married, and said something snide about Dad not being able to afford these knives and forks because he was a farmer, had no job, etc. yada yada. (Take a breath, Peggy)
was “Processional” by Fine Arts Sterling.
That’s “my first knife” in the center.
That’s when dad told the salesman that he wanted 6 place settings of that “Processional” silverware and handed the guy cash money for it all. Grandmother’s mouth hung open, Mom smiled. Dad grinned. (Mom told me) and Grandmother eventually changed her mind about Dad many years later. Those were my first and only knives, forks, and spoons until Piggly Wiggly had some stainless steel dinnerware that mom bought each week. We used “the silver” for breakfast, lunch and supper, every day: cheerios and milk; sardines, onions and crackers; or beans and cornbread. Oh, and I used them digging in the yard between meals until I got old enough to know better.
As for the original reflection on pocketknife ownership by Mr. Rick Bragg (above), as soon as I read the title, I knew Mr. Bragg could have just as easily have inserted “Somerset” to read, ” The Point of a Good Knife, or Any Somerset man worth his salt….” because there aren’t too many Somerset area men or women who haven’t been worth their salt. And, I’ll bet there’s a good knife story for each and every one.
NOTE: Permission to use Mr. Bragg’s story has been sought from Southern Living on 19 August 2020.
