Joe, reading your essays convinces me that you were quite close to declaring those brown-button Heiser look-alike sheaths with the "Randall-made" stamp as "Heiser-made" years ago.
http://www.rmkcollector.com/archives/the-randall-collector/a-johnson-sheath-footnote-part-iii/That is a darn good essay and presentation. All that was needed in my opinion was a gentle push... specifically a way to differentiate the two groups of brown-button sheaths. That has been provided now.
We now have found that one group of Brown button sheaths are identical in every respect with the Johnson baby dot sheaths. We also have another much larger group of BB sheaths that are identical in every respect with Heisers, except they have the Randall-made stamp. The two brown-button groups are different from each other in numerous ways.
Thanks for the accolades.
Johnson BB sheaths varied a bit early on. They aren't really identical to some of the BD from the immediate period thereafter. Johnson did use more than one machine whereas it appears HKL predominatley used one machine with a few odd balls thrown in. Sometimes the oddballs might actually be a Johnson as Johnson did use Heisers as examples.
Since a "Randall-made" stamp was actually manufactured and put into use in 1959... why is it difficult to accept that it would have been easy to just mail that stamp to Heiser and tell them to use it? Mr. Randall had to do that to someone in any case.
It is not known to have happened. At stated in the post to Ron, Gary says no. I gotta go with that first along with there is no outstanding confirmation that Bo did do that, but it certainly is part of the discussion.
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RE: those odd snaps. I would surmise both of those snaps were installed at the shop on a Heiser sheath that was forwarded without the hone pocket snap.
Why would the sheath be sent w/o stone pouch snap in place?
That would mean the shop had to have the press for those snaps. Possible, but BB's were the snap of the day and the shop was a knife making shop, not a leather fabricator.
Installation of a snap into leather is not complicated nor does it require a sophisticated machine. All that is needed is a hand crimper-type tool. The factory did not usually install the keeper snap in any case. That was generally done at Randall shop after the knife was "fitted" and it was done with such a hand-tool. Heck, you can buy a tool and snap and some leather and try it yourself... it isn't difficult.
the shop uses the hand tool type to set the keeper, while Sullivan's used the throw lever press crimper-type too. Sullivan's does not even have a hand crimper. They use a punch and a hammer if they have to "fix" one by hand.
These snaps are definitely a set, but odd-ball in that they are not the baby dots adopted later. If Heiser had installed the snap on the hone pocket, it would have been necessary for the Randall shop to have an identical snap available at his shop to make the set. That is unlikely..
Agree
There are plenty of examples of mis-matched snap sets from the '59-'60 time period when the supply of brown buttons ran out. In that short period when neither party had snaps, Heiser would install one type of expedient snap on the hone pocket, and the shop would often install a different expedient snap on the keeper. (Ron has written extensively about this with lots of photo documentation in a dedicated line elsewhere)
So... my conclusion is that it is most likely that Heiser forwarded that sheath without any snaps and that Randall installed both snaps which were a temporary, possibly a one-off expedient. It is unlikely that the two shops, 1,500 miles apart had identical one-off temporary snaps available.
Regards
Disagree that the sheath was sent to RMK sans stone pouch snap. That sheath had that snap put on at HKL. Now the keeper is another story. that may explain why it is so far off center.
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