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Any new information on these "Presto" M2 knives?


Garandy
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USAAF? WW2 Paratroopers?

5" long, black metal scales, no lanyard bail.

For some reason my other pics are too big, tryimg to add smaller

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The only thing that has changed for me is that I am another year older and have yet to have any compelling evidence come forward that these metal handled knives were ever a US military issued knife.

Here is a link to my original thread on WWII airborne switchblades. http://www.usmilitariaforum.com/forums/index.php?/topic/259640-wwii-airborne-switchblades/ For whatever reason, it has been determined by the edged weapons gurus that it isn't worthy of being pinned, but I stand behind my research.
Allan

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Charlie Flick

For whatever reason, it has been determined by the edged weapons gurus that it isn't worthy of being pinned, but I stand behind my research.

Allan

 

Hi Alan:

 

I have solved that issue. Your earlier thread is now pinned. It was an excellent and well-considered thread even if, as you said there, you "....don't collect knives other than airborne pieces and don't hang out with the knife collecting crowd." ;

 

You have contributed to the body of knowledge and that is valuable. Thank you.

 

Regards,

Charlie

(A member of the Knife Collecting Crowd)

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Charlie and Sactroop,

 

Thank you for the kind words. While I don't normally have a lot to contribute to this section of the USMF, it doesn't mean that I am not here reading the threads on a daily or near-daily basis. The expertise here is outstanding. I was prompted to start my thread on WWII paratrooper knives because I was seeing some astronomical prices being asked for various "paratrooper" knives, but there was a lack of documentation as to their origins. I consider myself to be in a rather small minority of collectors in that I started specializing in WWII airborne at a rather young age and at a time when you could still find plenty of veterans. Some still had their knives even 35 years after the war. Now, more that 75 years has passed and the number of still-living WWII paratrooper vets that I know is down to a handful.

 

When I was a youngster just starting out collecting WWII, I had an old Civil War collector talk about incorrect and downright fake items becoming highly collectible in the CW collecting ranks. When I asked him what he meant, he told me that when he had started collecting CW, there were still a large number of CW veterans to talk to. Many items that the veterans stated weren't used during the war started showing up in collector references years later. Where I have only encountered the two variations of paratrooper switchblades, collectors like Cole and others have expanded the collector "want list" to over a dozen variations.

 

Allan

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