Hall of Fame

Ka-Bar Knives Suburbian Bum--"Ka-Bar" is the registered treademark of a knife company. They make great pocket knives, and have for years. I have a real old one that belonged to my grandfather. The "Kabar" name is an acronym--it refers to an old tale about Daniel Boone (who?) who allegedly killed a bar (a bear) with nothing but a large fighting knife. Ka-Bar= "Kill-A-Bar." The "Ka-Bar" I'm talking about, and the name which I took as my handle, is the USMC KaBar knives that are issued to Marines. It is pronounced "KAY-bar." Back during WWII, there was a Marine Corps unit called "Marine Raiders." They were disbanded after the war was over, the idea being every Marine is a Marine Raider, the Marine Corps didn't need any special unit of extra-crispy Marines. This special unit of Marine Raiders were issued special knives, produced by the Ka-Bar Company. It looks mostly like a Bowie knife. Today, the KaBar knife is issued to any Marine whose "duty" weapon is an M-9 pistol. This would include officers, machinegunners, some mortarmen and air crew. Regular Marine grunts, whose "duty weapon" is an M-16A2 rifle, or an M-4 rifle, are issued bayonets. However, most young Marines buy a Marine KaBar knife from the Post Exchange or out of a catalog, and if they ever get sent to a combat zone, nobody is going to tell them "You can't carry it", as long as they carry their bayonet also. In civilian life, Marine Ka-Bar knives are "prohibited weapons," at least they are in Texas. The blade is 7" long, and any knife with a blade longer than 5-1/2" is a prohibited weapon in Texas. KaBars also have a "false" edge, i.e., the TOP of the blade is sharpened back about 2-1/2" from the point. This makes it a "poinard", or dagger, which is also a prohibited weapon. You can own it, but you cannot carry it off of your own property. Today, Marine Corps "KaBars" are produced on a U.S. Government mil-spec contract by the Camillus Cutlery Company. They are stamped "U.S.-Camillus." Real genuine WWII KaBars are worth a small fortune as collector's knives. Most were lost or destroyed in combat. A few made in back home and most of the Marines that were issued one stole it and took it home with them after the war. I carry a knife that I cut down from a butcher knife. It has a 5-3/8" blade, so it is legal to carry in Texas. I carried upwards of $200 on me all the time back in the day. Way back when there were laws called "vagrancy laws." It was illegal to be broke, more or less. In California the minimum legal limit for vagrancy was $5. If you didn't have $5 on you all the time, you could be arrested and charged with vagrancy and "no visable means of support. There was an old hippie song that went to the tune of "Carolina in the Morning": Nothing could be finer than five bucks in your vagina, in the m-o-o-rning; Nothing could be sweeter, than five bucks wrapped 'round your peter, in the m-o-o-rning! Anybody wanted my money had better be ready to fight for it. I wasn't inclined to give it up easy.