A little Web-cruising reveals that the carving set that I was lucky enough to find at last weekend’s estate sale must have been made before 1950.
After I cleaned the knife’s blade, a maker’s mark became visible:
Universal
L F & C
“L F & C” stands for Landers, Frary, & Clark, once a prominent manufacturer of household appliances and hardware. Founded in 1862, Landers, Frary, & Clark discontinued its cutlery division in 1950, giving us a terminus ad quem. So that would make the set at least 59 years old.
The handles are probably celluloid. Apparently the company made some products with Bakelite embellishments, but I can’t find any specific statement that L F & C used it for knife handles. On the other hand, this set, whose ferrule (the little ring at the top of the handle) is identical to the ones on mine, is said to have celluloid handles. On the third hand, the writer of this sales pitch incorrectly says the blade and fork tangs are made of stainless steel. They are not: as you can see at a glance, they’re wonderful carbon steel.
This knife enthusiast decribes celluloid as likely to decompose as it ages and remarks that one way to recognize celluloid is that the blade tends to rust. While there are a couple of rust spots on the estate-sale steel, they look like places where drops of water were accidentally left on it; the other pieces show no signs of rust. The blade is pitted in a couple of places along the top edge, so it could have shown some rust and been scoured clean. None of the handles show any sign of decomposition. Yet.
This guy is claiming a similar handle is “bone,” but like our seller who can’t tell the difference between carbon and stainless steel, his claim is dubious. A close look at the photo at this site shows straight, even stripes, very faint ivory-on-ivory, similar to those on the estate-sale treasure:
Another knife enthusiast mentions in passing that Landers, Frary, & Clark used bone on kitchen forks. IMHO, these lines are way too straight to be natural. When seen on end, at the tip of the set’s handles, the lines show an even herringbone grain. Anything’s possible, I suppose…but I’ll bet nothing that precise is natural.
We’re told that the way to distinguish celluloid from the more desirable Bakelite is by warming it under hot water and sniffing it. Bakelite supposedly smells like formaldehyde or an old-fashioned Bandaid, whereas celluose smells like vinegar or camphor. This test results in “none of the above.” It might have a slight Bandaid odor, but it’s so slight as to be most likely imaginary. Lucite, which was fashioned in colors including the ivory-like tint on our set, has no odor but is said to be lightweight; these handles are not. This outfit shows a close-up of a knife and steel set with celluloid handles, which also seems to show those straight lines.
So, I’m guessing the set’s handles are celluloid. Think I’ll take them out of the glass-fronted buffet where they’re now displayed, since corrosive outgassing would wreck the wooden shelves in there. And they’d probably better be used and enjoyed before they start to fall apart.