Camillus Out of Business

[gunbarrel]

Click on the link for the story...

 

http://www.9wsyr.com/news/local/story.aspx...de-761b46d754be

 

"Camillus (WSYR) - One of the oldest knife manufacturing companies in the United States, from right here in Central New York, closed its doors today.

About 40 people from the Camillus Cutlery plant punched out for the last time today.

 

The union's president says workers were notified earlier this week. But they were told they would not receive any severance pay.

 

In May of last year, 78 union workers walked off the job. Six months later, they agreed on a new contract, but only 17 people got their jobs back. The cutlery has been making knives since 1876...."

 

Excerpt from WSYR-TV, Mar 1, 2007 12:23 AM, http://www.9wsyr.com

[scooter]

Truely unfortunate, Another landmark passed over to a footnote in history.

[Costa]

will their ww2 produced knives now be in demand?

[gunbarrel]

costa,

 

I don't think that market will be affected. Some of their later models may be. For example, a couple of years ago they were liquidating some "desert pattern" knives they made and Frank Trzaska recommended buying them, because they didn't make very many of them and the price was right. I bought one each a Mark 2, a Jet Pilot Knife and a MIL-K knife. Those may increase in value, although I don't think it'll be enough for me to retire on

[bayonetman]

I have always had an interest in the Camillus US military knives, and have quite a few of them. Really sorry to see them go under as they have been one of the few companies that have tried to assist collectors through their historian Tom Williams. Their recent union problems along with the huge increase in foriegn made knives made it difficult for them to remain profitable and I know that this closing has been hinted at for some time.

 

The closure of other companies such as Imperial in recent years did not seem to add any premium to their military knives, and I really don't expect the demand for WW2 or later Camillus military knives to take any real jump.

 

Some of the other brand names were purchased following the closure of the companies (Camillus owned several) and I would not be surprised to see some other company buy the Camillus and other trade names and start marketing Chinese made knives under the Camillus name.

[Costa]

its a real shame how the heritage of this country is being destroyed bit by bit. man-- some day we are going to pay a big price for all this and if we needed our manufacturing base like during ww2 we are in deep sh-t. it wont be there.

[coastie]

It is sad to see another American company go down the tubes. However Camillus couldn't compete with the market today. Case, Gerber and several others are doing okay. I think that Camillus was stuck in a time warp and didn't diversify their market. It seems they were still cranking out the same knives today that they did 40 years ago and relying on Government contracts to keep them afloat.

[collectsmedals]

I live near Camillus New York where the cutlery company was located. According to th local media the company, which is family owned, had not updated their manufacturing equipment or methods and were therefore unable to complete. The truly sad part if they left a lot of long time employees out in the cold without jobs.

[Guest Chris]

I live in Camillus and can throw a rock from my house and hit the cutlery. The greed of the union employees as well as mismanagement led to the downfall of that once great American company.