Hey Steve,

Your kilt/knife picture is a good one! Yep, you are right about the sgian dubh being the wee knife in the sock. A dirk goes the belt. I rarely carry a dirk, as they always clank around and do raise eyebrows.

A Clinton Special is a good idea.

Cheers,

Alan
RKS #5531

Ron,
To hypothesize that the handle was put on upside down presumes that the finger grips are ground into the stag before the handle is installed which, of course, isn't the case. As long as we're all guessing, I'm gonna stay with an etched trademark over the remnants of a poor stamp.

Steve,
That's an excellent example of an etched TM over a stamp. Here's an example of a double stamp or stamp over stamp vs etched over stamp.

For what it's worth, an authorized dealer showed me an old model 2 that just had a portion of the little knife part of the stamp on it, the handle actually, and told me that GR told him (and now I'm telling you, making this about 3rd hand info), that back in the day, Bo Randall would send out a knife if there was any portion of a stamp on it recognizable as a Randall stamp.

Possibly a disatisfied customer back in those days might request the etch on such a knife?
I'm just guessing, no need to pile on....

If a knife that has a shallow stamp is sent back to be refinished, wouldn't the refinishing take steel away, leaving little or no trace of the original shallow stamp? If so, then it would make sense for the shop to etch the logo right over it.
-Steve

Since the finger grips are ground after the stag is installed, was it put together incorrectly or perhaps the finger grips were simply done on the wrong side?

Check out this stamp that got out the door at a time that more important things were going on than a legible stamp:

Even thought the stamping info is interesting, how did we get from a Model #2 knife discussion to a stamping discussion?

Tom V.