From the introduction to the "Knife of the week thread", and from Gaddis...
"As Ward described the knife, the blade should be "4 1/2 inches from the hilt to the tip," and he didn't want much of a notch, or cutout, ahead of the hilt. The sharp point where the cutout met the cutting edge was the real problem. As Ward explained, "When skinning, we use the full blade to skin with, and this notch catches when you're skinning and stops the knife from cutting. In other words, the corner seems to catch. I prefer not to have it on a knife."
All of the "original", or early Ward Gay model 20s pictured in this thread (for arguments sake, lets say all 7 spacer knives) are true to Ward Gays requirements laid out in the above paragraph. There is no "point" or "catch" forward of the hilt on the cutting edge. This was pretty much Ward Gay's only "don't" in the design. It seems that the grind, shape, or style of blade morphed away from that, later examples in roughback sheathes show the progression back to a full choil, and the recently re-introduced Ward Gay #20 sports a full choil.
I'm betting there's an explanation for why this is done, the manufacturing process isn't conducive to the different grind, or some other reason. So, can someone "in the know" offer up the reasoning behind moving away from Ward Gay's original intent for the model 20? Just curious...
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Wally
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