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tlineopen  American Silver before sterling
tline3open  Coin Silver Dinner Knives & Carving Set

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Author Topic:   Coin Silver Dinner Knives & Carving Set
Brent

Posts: 1507
Registered: May 99

iconnumber posted 12-15-2004 04:32 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Brent     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote

Here are some items that I can not recall ever seeing in coin silver; full sized dinner knives and a carving set. The pieces pictured came as a lot with 12 luncheon knives with silver blades, bearing the trademark of Albert Coles. All of the pieces have the same monogram, "Curtis", and were likely purchased at the same time. The pattern is essentially identical to John Polhamus' LOUIS XIV, but several manufacturers produced very similar ones.

The dinner knives are 10 3/4 inches long. The blades are silverplated carbon steel, unlike the silver blades on the luncheon set.

The carving set has unplated carbon steel functional ends. The handles are an elongated version of those on the dinner knives, with a sort of "double joint". The blade of the knife is marked "PRATT, ROPES & Co. / AMERICAN CUTLERY". This firm was in business from at least the early 1840's to the 1870's in Meriden, CT.

Anyway, I thought others might like to see these rare survivors.

Brent

[This message has been edited by Brent (edited 12-15-2004).]

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labarbedor

Posts: 353
Registered: Jun 2002

iconnumber posted 12-15-2004 11:25 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for labarbedor     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Brent are those your photos, they are not up to your usual standard?
Are the handles the same size on the dinner and luncheon knives? Either way are you sure the blades are original? If they are original dinner knives, in my opinion, they could be the earliest American examples known. We gave a set to Winterthur, but even at the time I thought they were dessert knives, and I don't remember their length now. I don't remember ever seeing American silver handled dinner knives before about 1880.

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Brent

Posts: 1507
Registered: May 99

iconnumber posted 12-16-2004 04:21 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Brent     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Hi,

Sorry for the picture quality; I will try to post some more shortly.

The dinner knife handles are significantly larger than the luncheons. Unfortunately, I sold the luncheons and do not have measurements. I am sure that the knife blades are original, as I had them reset into the handles. A few were quite loose and/or off-center, as if the original producer had some trouble getting them right. The blades were polished when reset, so they look too shiny now; my mistake.

It is interesting to note that there was no visible seam between the silver blade and the handle on the luncheon knives, but there is a clear joint on these pieces. I'm not sure how the "all-silver" knives were manufactured.

The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that this set represents a custom order, at a time when most dinner cutlery had ivory or wooden handles.

I agree, this is a very early set of silver handle knives!

Brent

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labarbedor

Posts: 353
Registered: Jun 2002

iconnumber posted 12-16-2004 09:05 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for labarbedor     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I don’t know if the scarcity is due to attrition and how much is due to the fact they weren’t in demand here. The earliest set American silver I have had with dinner knives is some Kirk fiddle thread, where the owner purchased the knives from England (or perhaps Kirk did). Like I said the next set with American dinner knives was probably 1880 or so. Quite often down South set were sterling sets were still using pear handled knives in the around 1890. To bad the knife blades aren’t marked, maybe we could have found some records. I presume there is no way to tell if the carving set was made by the same maker?

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Bob and Carol Carnighan

Posts: 63
Registered: Apr 99

iconnumber posted 12-16-2004 10:28 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Bob and Carol Carnighan     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Please clarify. Are you discussing the earliest hollow handle knives with blunt silver plated blades or solid silver knives? Polhamus
made hollow handle BSP knives in Ionic.

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