All About Pocket Knives

Got this today, I know nothing about this company except they obvisously made very good knives, this has super solid walk and talk half stop is good, tbh all is good but I have never heard of these guys ?

Any info would be great.

Cheers

JT

JT that's Yorkshire Steel Company, 1911-1921. They were based in London but I have no idea if they made the knives themselves. Copied this info off the web:

"YORKSHIRE STEEL COMPANY LTD
Advertisement from the Ironmonger Diary, 1924


This company was the creation of Harold Edward Sherwin Holt (1862-1932) CBE. He was born in Harrogate, Yorkshire, the son of Joseph Holt – a wealthy cloth merchant and manufacturer – and his wife, Matilda. Sherwin Holt became an inventor and industrialist, who was involved in the developing automobile and aeronautical industries. By 1911, he was living on ‘private means’ at The Grange, Farnborough, Hampshire. He apparently launched Yorkshire Steel Company at about this time as a vehicle for marketing his patented ideas. These included a boxed de-luxe safety razor, which was advertised as having the finest blade ever produced and ‘made entirely of British material’.

The company’s office was in Holborn, London, but after the First World War Holt also opened a Sheffield office in Rockingham Street. Besides the safety razor, Holt began marketing straight razors, scissors, pocket knives, and table cutlery. These products were advertised in The Ironmonger (London), The American Cutler, and in Australasia, where the company had agents. Cutlery was branded with the initials ‘YSC’ or ‘ORA-NOVA’ on safety razors. ‘APIS’ was stamped on stainless cutlery, which was marked ‘UNSTAINABLE’. It is not known whether Holt’s venture into cutlery was profitable. He died on 3 January 1932 (leaving £71,798) and a few months later Yorkshire Steel Co Ltd was liquidated."

Eric

Cheers Eric,

Guessing my Knife is early 20th or late 19th Century then ?? Whatcha reckon ???

JT

JT I think the time between 1911 and 1921 was when his cutlery business existed, so I'd say your knife would date from some time in that decade.

Eric

ea42 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 20, 2023 8:40 pm JT I think the time between 1911 and 1921 was when his cutlery business existed, so I'd say your knife would date from some time in that decade.

Eric

Cheers Eric,

It still amazes me how good the condition of this knife is 100 years later, the snap is great and it is so well made.

I have brand new Case XX models with more wobble and 50% less snap !!!

Beautiful example, Jon.