New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1885-05-22
TIE CASE or TIE POCBErKNIFE.

1t Is said that the manufacture OF pocket-knives
AT Naugatuck, Conn, which used ~ be great In
dustry, keeping four large factories IN constant
work is practically dead. Now this fact, If It be
fact opens up a broad Of speculation aud con-
lecture. Its meaning must not be hastily guessed
al. for ii may involve social and national changes
of deep import; and then again, it may not Should
II appear upon fuller research that the demand for
pocket-kn1ves has ceased. 1t would be necessary
TO conclude not only that the ancient and honora-
bic pastime aud art of whiting had been ADAM
doDed. but hat a change Of The most revolution
ary. not to say cataelysmal character. had passed
over the habits of the Small Boy. Aud il is hard to
believe in the reality OF such change. whiting
indeed has long been doomed by the approach OF
the extinction of American forests. When the last
strip OF pine woods disappears under the vandal
axe OF the lumbcrman, the noble mental discipline
AND milestone of American intellect known as whit
Ting must perish for your hard woods do not
Weld themselves to the blade of tho whittier, whit
tie he never 30 deftly. Undoubtedly tins is TO be
depIored Yankee craft and keenness have been
largely nurtured upon this practice, and Yankee
philosophy has been evolved ont Of the smooth
shaving away of the yielding, cheeseike. soft pine
stick IL may we'll be that the abandonment of
whiting will result IN extensive physical and
mental notifications of the Yankee race, since it
involves the elimination of the fonce-stting opera
ton the corner grocery cracker-bOx habit, and
many other influential tendencies and customs.
But none of the threatened changes IN this di-
rcction vie IN gravity with the alarming lntima-
tion that the Small Boy and the Pocket-K Knife
becoming separated. For such an occurrence as
this would imply revolution radical as
to reach the very depths of national develop
ment. II would argue a change In the very inner
most nature of Young America. and n change
Lar
The Pocket Knife has from the dawn of history been
the Palladium Of Boyhood. There is reason to be-
lieve that the Trogodytes possessed pocket-knives
before they had pockets In those primitive times
they bestowed things in their ears, which were
proyidentially capacIous, or IN their HAIR, which
WAS thick. Since then the Pocket Knife has been
the chef tutor Of the Anglo-Saxon race 1t has de
yeloped in Its multitudnous possessors all the
tues Of their kind. 1t has taught them the
mechanic arts. the science of swapping. the mys-
terles Of bass-wood pumpkin seeds and wooden
bans and all that lifts the present heir Of all the
ages above his prOgnathous predecessors who low
cred themselves by associatlng with the mammoth
and the cave-bear 1t is indeed impossible to think
OF the Small Boy of this any period without also
thinking of the Pocket-Knifc. The two indeli-
bly, united by the cuts on countless char legs
table edges school-desks, and woodwork general
". Energy, destructveness, mischief, restless
ness, are thus typihed throughout the land. And
without his Pocke-Knife the Small boy would be
but the shade of his former self. He would be
changed out of knowledge. lie would be as
tiyeless, rs impotent as Samson with his hair cut.
Let us hope. therefore. that the chastity rumOr
waited from Naugatuck means other than appears
on the surface. Let hope that the centre of the
pocket-knife manufacture has shifted; that the
knives come from somewhere else; anything, IN
short but that the demand for these symbols and
types of advancing civilization has ceased aud
that hereafter the whistle of the whittier Will no
LONGER pierce the air, AID the cry of the Small Boy
who has cut his finger be heard no more among us
forever.