BOOK REVIEW
Reviewed by Knife World staff

The sepia toned cover depicting grinders of decades past hunched over their work at the W.R. Case & Sons factory sets the perfect mood for this interesting book, which contains more than 200 historical photographs collected from the Case archives, Case family members, and Case associates past and present – most never before published.

Compiled by Official Case Historian Shirley Boser and Case’s Director of Marketing John Sullivan, this new book is part of Arcadia’s “Images of America” series, which includes nearly 1000 books on subjects relating to the history of small communities across America. This is the publisher’s first book on knives or cutlery, having discovered Case while producing a similar book about the firm’s parent company, Zippo.

The new book celebrates the history of W.R. Case & Sons in photographs dating from the company’s earliest years up through to the present, arranged for the most part in a chronological fashion. Though the book is divided into five chapters that delineate important eras in Case Cutlery history – The Early Years; W.R. Case & Son, Little Valley, N.Y.; the Bank Street Factory in Bradford; the Russell Boulevard Factory; and the South Bradford Factory, it is by no means inferred that the reader should feel obligated to do anything but flip through and enjoy the antique photographs and their descriptive captions. Appropriately, the book closes with a chapter dedicated to The Case Collectors, to whom W.R. Case & Sons largely owes their survival and success.

An easy, casual read, Images of America – W.R. Case & Sons pleasantly contrasts with Brad Lockwood’s detailed history The Case Cutlery Dynasty, the two books making fine companions for each other. If you enjoy history, especially knife history, the faces and places in these old photographs will whisk your mind back to a simpler time, in places whose names are forever etched into the minds of knife enthusiasts everywhere.

Softcover, 128 pp., $19.95

Availability: Usually ships the next business day.

$19.95