A widely spread misunderstanding

[dr73]

Dear fellow collectors. I would like to start a discussion about the position of the maker mark on the blades of army daggers. Frequently I read comments on various forums where people state that "the maker mark is on the wrong side". In my opinion there is absolutely no evidence that the maker mark should always be on the backside. Over the years I have encountered dozens of army daggers with the maker mark on the front side. Even on daggers of the large manufacturers like Eickhorn and WKC.

Ofcourse you could say that this was the work of veterans that decided to switch the blade but in my opinion that doesn't make sense. Why would they even bother. In the early days they thought all army daggers were the same anyway. Also some people say that this was the result of collectors making a mistake when they replaced a bad blade by a better one and accidently put the maker mark on the wrong side. Also an argument that does not make much sense to me. Why do we encounter so many of these "badly switched blades" and why wouldn't the collector notice that the maker mark was hardly visible when he took out the blade to admire his dagger.
Last but not least. It is quite a coincidence that when we do find an army dagger with the makermark on the front, in many cases it just happens to have a frozen pommel

I do believe that most manufacturers preferred their maker mark on the back because this way you can see it the best. But we must not forget that these daggers were assembled by humans and not by machines. It is not very hard to imagine that a worker who assembles dozens of daggers a day, can easily overlook the position of the maker mark. In my experience there also are certain makers of which their daggers are found with a maker mark on the front relatively often. Examples are Alcoso and Gebr. Heller.

Last but not least I think that many blades that originaly had the makermark on the front were switched back because the collector that owned the dagger thought that was the right way.

Regards
Danny

[Larry C]

Hi Danny I agree also with the Heer type daggers.

Separate from Political daggers..I see nothing wrong as you have noted with the logo being on the obverse side of the blade..... Just as long as the dagger itself is consistent in detail expected by those producers and not being a "Parts dagger "

If it were parts..then the chance of authenticity lessens as being a whole ensemble.
We dont see these happening with 2nd Luftwaffe daggers.at least not on a wide scale..as much as Heer.

The possibility can relate all the way back to the original wearer doing the turn around himself ! We as humans tend not to conform to what is normal..and make adjustments to physical things or circumstances to fit our daily routine..or what we think would look better and appreciative.

Dont we move furniture or adjust our displays to "Our" liking..and not some others thoughts? It would not be personable if we let someone else make these "adjustments in the physical" ..or make life decisions for us..which that in its owns is dangerous and not a topic to chat about now.

The Heer dagger has been a topic of contempt because of widely seen fittings being shared from producer to producer..until our Danny and Gerrit blew the lid off the mystery and authored a reference on the Heer dagger. The mystery is removed..and including the misinterpretation of the reversed blade.

Rock On !

Regards Larry

[dr73]

The misunderstanding still exists, so here are a few more examples to convince the non-believers Also, please note the many different makers.....

[gerrit]

I have had quite a few with Logo on front, and indeed Heller has got the logo quite often on the front side.
I recently bought an alcoso mini with a frozen pommel and the logo on the frontside.
Regards,
Ger

This Alcoso mini is the large one.
There is also a misunderstanding as they are often called salesmans samples.
Looking at the Original Ads that Alcoso published they are called "Letteropeners" when its a just a mini, and they are called "Paperweights" when they have a base like this one.
I will ask permission for posting the Original Alcoso Ads to this post on the owner of the catalog.

[Anderson]

That makes sense. I could never understand who these salesmen were that were carrying around all these minis in a brown bag somewhere. More likely they were for the "desk jockeys" back at HQ so they could open their letters with a little style.

[dr73]

A few more examples....

[dr73]

Since there recently was another post about the trademark being on the wrong side, I thought is was time to add a few more examples to show that there is no such thing as a trademark on the wrong side And I think I've shown that it can be seen on A LOT of different makers

[gerrit]

Well Danny some daggers look quite familiar to me

Ger

[AZPhil]

I know this is the Heer dagger section, but I would like to ask about other TR daggers.

This had me thinking about other daggers I have seen where the Maker logo was showing on the front of the dagger. Was it correct or taken apart and put back together wrong. Now you have me wondering...…...

Will there be examples made by the Makers shown above that do this to the other service daggers they made?
Or is this exclusive to Heer daggers only?

Semper Fi
Phil

[Larry C]

Vet acquired examples not parted together but as found with logo on the front is acceptable in the Heer community...but not all producers.

Danny or Ger can elaborate further.

Best Larry