The "Last of the Mohicans". These two Bowies were among those that left the Shop mounted with elephant ivory in February 2013(?). Both have nickel silver hilts, collars, and butt caps. Subsequently, the Randall Shop stopped taking new orders for mounting elephant ivory.

Inspite of a climate-controlled room, both ivory handles showed cracks after about three weeks. According to Jim Gates, who had an outstanding collection of ivory-handled Randalls, nickel-silver butt caps generate heat in the finishing stage, and may have contributed to the cracks. He suggested that nickel-silver butt plates would have generated less heat in the finishing stage. This information came from an article in "Knife Knews" a few years ago.

Someone had quipped that if an ivory-handled knife hadn't cracked , there was something wrong with the ivory.

Got a four hour jump on "Two-fer Tuesday".