All About Pocket Knives

Picked up this Queen made Winchester Barlow. Trying to get an idea of when they were made, can find very little information n them.

In my opinion it is not an original Winchester(1920-1940) but an attempt by some quick buck artist to increase the value of what was at one time an inexpensive Queen barlow. I may be wrong. Nobody seemed to want to comment so I decided to open my mouth. I hope I don't regret it.

I would say it is a Blue Grass Cutlery Winchester. Queen made these, just like they did at least some of the Blue Grass Primbles. Not a fraud. My opinion.

Thanks David, I also thought it is a Blue Grass Queen Winchester but not part of the black box series from the 80's as I can find no reference to a Barlow.
I have only found pictures of one other example and it has a clip blade,apparently not many were made.

john,
if that is the one i had on ebay, i looked and could not ever find much to compare it with.
to date it , found a lot with spear blades, but i did find a schrade on blade forums, that
looked just like it except for the tang stamps. but i dont believe it was a cobble

thanks cato

Cato, I don't believe it is a cobble either, to well made. Queen was known to make Winchester stamped knives in the 80's just can't confirm the Barlow.
Queen Barlow bolsters are unique, no other maker uses that shape that I have seen. Here is a pic of 2 of my other Queens, the latest one is a dead ringer to these.

Your Queen's are 4 pin and the one with the Winchester stamp has 3.

I agree with Sanders, not a Queen made Winchester authorized by Blue Grass. I have never seen a bone handled barlow in any of the Queen made Winchester releases, nor a razor barlow. Also the Queen made Wins all had pattern numbers and years stamped, at least the bone handled knives.

john if this knife is not right, and you wish to return it, no problem

i sure couldn't tell if it was not right, it was a very well made knife,
man i wish i could do one that nice, i sure wouldn't put someone else"s
name on it

cato wrote:john if this knife is not right, and you wish to return it, no problem

i sure couldn't tell if it was not right, it was a very well made knife,
man i wish i could do one that nice, i sure wouldn't put someone else"s
name on it

Thanks, but I'm going to keep it, I think the knife is factory made and pretty high quality, everything other than the 1 pin matches up exactly to my other Queens, dimensions are dead on.
I'l be able to show the knife to someone next summer that may be able to tell me for sure if it was made by Queen and for who.
Thanks again for your offer.

You might try to send a picture via e-mail to Bill Howard at Great Eastern. Pretty sure he'd be able to confirm if that knife came out of Queen.

Just call me Steve too or three . Did Bluegrass Winchester even make a barlow,I can't remember seeing one?

We have a list of those Winchesters somewhere on this site.....

Updating the thread, got a chance to show the knife to Bill Howard, short version, turns out it is a prototype built at Queen for a customer that always requested prototypes.There were no more than 6 made and probably less. Lyle was at the table with me and may remember a few more details, one thing I do remember is Bill said they hated making the prototypes as it was more difficult to set the machinery to make a few knives rather than do a whole run of knives.

Thanks for the update John. Was the prototype for Bluegrass?

edge213 wrote:Thanks for the update John. Was the prototype for Bluegrass?

Bill did not say who the customer was only that they hated making the prototypes.

Yes, Dave Scott ,I think, insisted on having six prototypes,but Bill said that didn't always happen. John asked him if there were five more somewhere and he said not necessarily. If one assembled was enough to keep him satisfied,that was as far as Bill went.

SWEET, Nice info hunt...

never know.. you know

Queen also made saw-cut bone barlows for Blackjack way back when......

brucegodlesky wrote:Queen also made saw-cut bone barlows for Blackjack way back when......

When I hear "Blackjack", I think fixed blades out of Effingham. Educate me.

Interesting thread - I thought it weird that someone would use such an identifiable Barlow frame to attempt a fake, versus all the OTHER cutlers with their hands in the Winchester pot later on in the 20th. I have two examples of a Queen-built Ontario 606 Barlow (Delrin faux-wood handles, with the OLD HICKORY stamping from so many vintage fixed blades and folders which I believe travelled from cutler to cutler). Immediately-identifiable Queen Barlow covered-spring frame and clip blade, "OK" Ontario tang stamp, and note the patent # 2728139 on the pen blade is the same as on many Queen knives with covered-backspring frames.
The OP Winchester prototype seems to have exposed backsprings which is very much like the Queen Rawhide series Barlow from the early '80s (see here with a Boker anniversary Barlow). Note that it also has 4 pins like JohnR's Barlow:
I've seen 2, 3, and 4-pin Queen Barlows on the "offset bolster" Barlow frames. Generally I see more with covered backsprings than without.

WOW! Haven't been her ein along time!

Mike Stewart had Cripple Creek/Blackjack barlows made in Titusville. Most were sawcut bone with a few stags thrown in.
I have one done in Chestnut......