I was always fascinated with the “Pioneer’s Park” near my house when I was growing up. You could walk around and see ladies churning butter by hand, men dressed up like Civil War soldiers, a blacksmith, and an old house with all the period furnishings. There is still something interesting about “simpler” times when things were done by hand and with great care. Of course, today things could be considered simpler because they don’t have to be made by hand and take little or no effort on our part to prepare.
You could imagine my excitement last Saturday morning, when I was sitting in the backyard of my brother’s Northwest Chicago home while setting up my Caja China for his housewarming party and heard the dull clanking of a bell in the distance. Tony, a middle-aged Italian American who grew up in the neighborhood, told me that he hadn’t heard that bell for about 10 years. He said it was the knife-sharpening man. Knife-sharpening man! How cool is that!
I ran out to the front of the house to find this little old man who must have been in his mid- to late 80s, pushing an antique cart with a giant flywheel and several stone sharpening wheels on it. The little old man looked at me with his giant Elton John sunglasses and dust mask. I couldn’t tell if he was more shocked of me than I was of his presence. (My enthusiasm can sometimes be overwhelming.) I told him that I had a knife for him to sharpen and ran to grab it from the backyard. I was so happy I had a knife, but being the avid amateur photographer, I was bummed I didn’t have my camera! I looked online for an image close to what my knife sharpener’s cart looked like and found this picture from the South Side of Chicago, circa 1968.
Thanks to e15rimac on Flickr for permission to use his picture of a knife-sharpener man from “back in the day.” My knife-sharpener man and his cart looked at least 40 years older.
It was such a sight to see the man take my cleaver, mount his sharpening machine, and then pump his little feet on the pedals of the big flywheel, the sparks flying from the steel blade. Traffic on Addison Street was slowing down to see this living museum piece in action. After a long turn on the big sharpening wheel, the cleaver made its way to the smaller wheel where it was honed; after that a little handheld stone that looked like a big rubber eraser was rubbed up and down the blade.
The result?
A very sharp cleaver! And a very excited chef. Some things to keep in my mind if you run into the knife-sharpening man… First, if you have a nice set of Henckels knives or any expensive knives with razor-sharp edges, you may not want to have them sharpened by the knife-sharpener man. He is, after all, using giant stones that essentially grind the edge of your knife. You would want to use a commercial-type knife or in my case, a solid steel cleaver. Big scissors and lawnmower blades are other items that would be well suited for the wheels of the knife-sharpening man.
Later that night, while sitting around the fire, after dining on roasted pork chopped up with my newly sharpened cleaver, Tony and his cronies talked about the old days in the neighborhood, when the knife guy, the berry guy, and the ice guy used to travel up and down the streets. They also talked about kicking pigs’ heads around during pig roasts and how they used to get tattoos at Jade Dragon way back in the ’70s. I don’t know, call me old fashioned, but the knife-sharpening man story is still the most memorable of the day.
We had a guy just like this come down our street in the late ’70s in Glen Ellyn. He told us he was just making his way back around to our street after many years. It was so weird to hear that clanging and run out and see him, and it was the only time he ever came around. We kids were so excited we ran and got knives for him to sharpen.
We have an ancestor, a Jewish immigrant from Russia, who landed in central Illinois. He had a horse & cart & grinding wheel. He sharpened scissors and knives, ground eyeglasses, “koshered chickens”, and circumcised baby boys. He had to cover a large rural territory in Decatur/Springfield to find enough Jewish customers to earn a living and send for his family. Has anyone ever heard of this occupation before? What is it called? His surname was Sherman. Now I wonder if that came from his occupation (Shear-man”)
I grew up in Des Plaines and heard him in the 1950′s and 1960′s. He also repaired things in addition to sharpening knives & scissors. Every time we heard the bell, my mother would start singing the Umbrella Man Song …
Toodleoomalooma,
Toodleoomalooma,
Toodleayay.
Any umbrellas,
Any umbrellas,
To mend today?
Bring your parasol;
It may be small, it may be big.
He’ll repair them all
With what you call
A thingummajig.
What a great memory!!
Jim from Des Plaines
Great story Jim! Thanks!
He just came down our street in La Grange! Makes one wish for old days in our country!
Is there anywhere to get plans to build a cart like that.
Interesting question john. I wonder if you may be able to get some info from a knife sharpening shop if you have one in your town. In Chicago, we have Northwest Cutlery which still uses sharpening wheels like the ones on this cart (they are electric though.) Many of these knife places probably started without using electricity and there could be older generations still working there. There was a place in North Beach in San Francisco that I have taken knives to get sharpened and they were still using pedal power. I’ll bet Da Vinci has some plans! Just kidding–I watched some people recreate his scythe machine and got me thinking about this–he would most likely need a sharpening cart to keep his scythes sharp. Just trying to think of some leads for plans if google fails to find any.
i have a knife sharpener, just like the one in the pic, does anybody know the value of it. call me 630 207 7650
[...] The Knife Sharpener [...]
Ha ha! I remember the knife sharpener man and his cart in Evanston in the late 50′s early 60′s.
I remember the “ding, ding dong, ding” of the scissor/knife sharpener cart coming down my street when I was growing up (I lived near Addison and Oak Park Ave.) I can’t believe there is someone who is still doing this! How wonderful! Very cool, indeed!
I grew up in Indiana Harbor/East Chicago,Ind. in the 1960s. These were quite common in our city.
One afternoon,as a kid, I saw about 10 these . My dad was a cop and took me to a city storage facility called The City Barns–an antiquated name!
The brick building was full of all types of city vehicles. Street sweepers. Snow plows. Dump trucks. There, off to the side,stood a platoon of these delightful red and green knife sharpeners.I had seen them forever,but never knew where they ‘”lived.”
It’s my impression that,back then, the city would hire these out to retired steel workers for a little cash.As I said, they were not uncommon . I know my grandpa pushed one for awhile.
The City Barn is long,long gone,torn down in the 1970s, and I have often wondered what happened to that little army of machines. It’s good to see a photo of one. Thank you.
Nice! Thanks.