Talk knives here at AAPK

A friend is trying to sell a set of three Case “Circle C Series” knives. He says he bought all three from Smoky Mountain Knife Works several years back and that they (Smoky Mountain) weren’t able to put a complete set together (serial number wise) so they made a set out of one of each of the knives that belonged to the series but the serial numbers are not consistent.

I’m no Case expert but I’ve been able to find out that they were produced in 1986. All the markings on them are the exact same except for the blade pattern stamp. Some of the blade pattern numbers don’t seem to jive with the knife, and I can’t locate the “Case” production stamp that is on all of these and any website. Any help y’all can provide would be very appreciated.

Here is a link to the pictures of the knives. Also, not all the numbers are all that legible, so here they are written out:

The bolster of the red Congress has 0924 on it, the tang stamp says R64088
The bolster of the green Congress has 0678 on it and the tang stamp says G62088 (the "G" is best guess, although it looks a bit more like a "6" than a "G")
The bolster of the stag Congress has 0883 on it and the tang stamp says 53088

Lastly, the nail nicks are much longer than I recall ever seeing on a Case. Is that normal?

The "G" stands for Green, the "R" stands for Red. The "0" in the pattern numbers just means a variation of the 88 pattern. The numbers on the bolsters are serial numbers. If it was a true set, the serial numbers would be the same. The knives are listed individually in Parker's Price Guide. Hope this helps.