How the Swiss Put an Essential Item on Your Camping Gear Checklist.

Whilst, during your next camping break, you look for your useful pen-knife or multi-tool, take a moment to remember the trip it followed to become an essential item on a rambler's camping gear list. Throughout the 1880s the Swiss Armed service wanted a twin purpose device that would be issued to all riflemen. It had to possess a blade (a have to for all servicemen) together with a screwdriver, a must have for assembly of the standard issue gun of that time. No supplier in Switzerland had the capacity to tackle the work so a German firm was responsible for the manufacture of the very first 15,000 delivered during 1891. Not happy that the manufacture was taking place in Germany a Swiss manufacturer, Karl Elsener, brought the process to Switzerland soon after this first run. Within the 1890s innovations appeared such as placing tools on each sides of the knife by making use of the very same spring mechanism for each side. This meant twice as many features could be built into each knife. The famous Victorinox brand name still in existence was created when Elsener merged his late mum’s name Victoria with ‘inox’ meaning Stainless Steel. Additionally during the 1890s yet another Swiss supplier known as Wenger started out manufacture of a comparable item. In 1908 in the expectation of triggering competition and possibly reduced prices the Swiss Army awarded half of the contract to each company. To the current time Wenger promotes itself as ‘the genuine Swiss Army knife’ and Victorinox as ‘the original Swiss Army knife’ by mutual consent. The name ‘Swiss Army knife’ was only used at the conclusion of World War 2 when GIs coming back from Europe bought the knives in their hundreds. Struggling with the German for The Officer’s and Sports Knife, the name by which it ended up being patented, they decided to refer to it by the name that we regognise in modern times and it has become synonymous with these multi-bladed and tooled utility knives. Despite the fact that Wenger has now been purchased by Victorinox both brand names have remained in existence incorporating new and innovative features being included over the generations. A risk to this sole Swiss production came in 2008 when the Swiss Armed Forces needed to open the business to the rest of the world under international trading legal guidelines. 7 companies in all bid by offering up a variety that then was subject to a series of tests. Victorinox ultimately came through the tests successfully and won the business for 75,000 knives plus cases. A range of types now exist with a variety of choices of tools and uses geared to every possible activity from the short camping trip to the break of a lifetime roughing it in every sense of the term. The Wenger ‘Giant’ is made up from every tool the company ever produced, involving eighty seven blades and 141 distinct functions it's the world’s most multi-functional pen knife. If you want one of these for your camping holiday it will set you back about £550 and would perhaps need to have its own rucksack and tent! A one-off pen knife with 314 different blades and tools, it weighs over 5 Kilos and is known as the world’s largest – not ideal for spontaneous jou eys. And so that is a short history of the Swiss Army Knife and how it got its name. All that and not 1 reference to the tool to extract stones out of horse’s hooves! Maybe that’s simply a myth after all.

You will find all the outdoor and camping gear you will need at My Outdoor Store, the premier walking and hiking outdoor gear store.