The American knife

The Poplar Bluff Museum tells many unknown tales of our community. I want to tell you some of those hidden tales found within the museum walls.

Hap Smith Jr. is a retired Marine veteran and a knife maker. When he was asked by the Vietnam Veterans of America and the Student Veterans Association of Three Rivers College to build a knife for them, he felt a sense of honor and pride.

He mentally thought out his course of action and the materials needed to build it. It had to be special. It was for veterans. The style had to be a large bowie knife. The steel came from the bumper of a 1946 Plymouth, post-WWII steel.

Smith stated “I wanted to be able to guarantee the origin of the steel to be American.”

He forged, straightened and heat treated it in his shop forge in North Carolina. It was an American-built knife forge.

The handles for the knife were from desert ironwood from the Sonoran Desert in Arizona: American wood. Six pins hold the handle together, one pin for each branch of service: Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Coast Guard and National Guard. (This was built before the creation of the Space Force.)

Smith said, “I don’t know how this knife could be more American.”

The American Knife is on display in the Kanell Hall of the Poplar Bluff Museum for all veterans to see and enjoy. Semper Fidelis, Hap.

The Museum is handicap accessible and open free of charge 1-4 p.m. Sunday at 1010 Main St. Tell them Mike sent you.

Mike Shane is a veteran, Poplar Bluff resident and board member for the Poplar Bluff Museum.