Profile In Steel
Written by Joan Poythress for "Billets and Blades"

And who says there is nothing good on television? This month's profile in steel actually began making knives by watching television. GPTV to be exact.

John Poythress has always loved knives. When younger, he worked summers in his uncle's feed and seed store. His parents hoped he'd learn the character traits of hard work, honesty, financial responsibility. Even though John was diligent and learned these lessons and others that his uncles taught him, who would have thought that from the knife display case in a feed & seed store in a rural south Georgia town, a knifemaker's spirit would be born?

As he got older, girls and motorcycles (riding and racing) came to the forefront, and it looked as if the knives had been a passing fancy until...

One Sunday afternoon, surfing the television, John happened up on a show on Georgia Public Television with knifemaker Jim Small demonstrating how to make a knife. This series ran for several Sundays. John was fascinated. Before this he thought hand made knives were crude instruments with blocks of wood for the handle.

John put the audio cassette recorder (this was before the time that VCR's were common place in homes) by the television to record every word said. Any noise made by Melanie or me met with a stern stare that let us know we were close to being banished from the house for an hour.

Then came the ordering of the books and supplies to get him started. While waiting for supplies, John needed to make his patterns. Sundays in small south Georgia towns had no outlet for knife making supplies so to begin his project the crisper top in the refrigerator was the first casualty to the knife making passion. To this day, I still have that knife pattern-and a new refrigerator.

John's work has come a long way from that first knife (which he still owns) that was made from the "How To Make A Knife" series about 20 years ago. Today he makes folders, daggers, and tantos. He uses a variety of steel and handle material. His greatest pleasure is to bring out the hidden masterpiece that can be found in a piece of steel, bone, prehistoric ivory, and man-made materials.