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How to Determine Age of Case Folding Knives

The W. R. Case &Sons Cutlery Company produced its first folding knife in 1905. Since then, it has produced hundreds of models (what the company calls "patterns") of heavy folding knives and pocket knives. Case knives are highly collectible, and one criterion collectors use is year of manufacture. Case makes it easy to date any folding knife within a few years, up until 1970, then to the exact year.

Instructions

- 1
  Locate the tang stamp on the base of a knife's largest blade. The stamp may be either a logo or words, but it will always include the word "Case." Do not confuse the tang stamp with the pattern stamp, which is a series of numbers and letters.
- 2
  Date your knife by matching the stamp against Case's online gallery of stamps. Case has used 33 different stamps since 1905. Some stamps have two "X"s, which signify a two-step heating and testing process, and some include the word "Tested."
- 3
  Observe whether the stamp includes any dots below the lettering, a date on either side of the letters "USA" (such as "19USA92"), or a series of dots and "X"s (such as ".X.X."). These markings place the date of manufacture from 1970 or later.
- 4
  Beginning in 1970, Case introduced its dot convention. Knives produced in 1970 had 10 dots below the word "Case," and the company removed a dot every year thereafter, until knives made in 1979 had just one dot. In 2000 the company introduced a series of dots and Xs, which looked somewhat like this:
  
  .x.x.
  CaseXX
  x.x.x
  
  For five years, Case removed one dot per year and one "x" per year thereafter. The company will introduce a new tang stamp in 2010.

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