The Stahly Live Blade
First of all, I would like to thank thirdeye for inviting me to contribute this week's entry into Safety Razor of Week archive. After a bit of thought over which of history's great razors to introduce, the obvious hit me. The Stahly Live Blade, one of my favorite non-Gillette razors, was the natural choice.
After almost 30 years of being treated to a great variety of luxurious double edge safety razors during the first part of the 20th century, the American civilian razor market came to a screeching halt on December 7, 1941 with the word of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Suddenly the entire American safety razor industry turned its attention to producing huge numbers of utilitarian razors meant to keep millions of servicemen around the world clean shaven. The days of the production of opulent razors remained on hold until the end of the on going World War. The German and Japanese surrenders of 1945 brought an end to the high end razor drought. 1946 became a banner year for the introduction of new standards of the shaving industry. Gillette reentered the fledgling "twist to open" market with the Milord, Ranger Tech, and Aristocrat, all geared toward the middle to upper-middle class markets with price tags in the one to five dollar range.
At this same time a new manufacturer hit the market with its own double edge razor, The Live Blade. This company, Stahly, Inc., hit the street running with a huge advertising campaign featuring full page magazine ads with artwork by James M. Sessions featuring scenes of hunting and fishing.
The standard Chrome version of the new Stahly Live Blade commanded an impressive $19.95 price tag, while the Silver plated, Gold plated-and-black, and Gold plated versions demanded $21.25, $22.50 and $24.25 respectively ... plus a 20% luxury tax! And there was a reason behind these prices. The Stahly live blade was advertised as "The World's Finest Razor" and as being "driven by a spring-powered mechanism that produced "about 3,000 vibrations-per-minute of positive shaving action".
The following ad demonstrates the inner working of the Live Blade.
This advertising campaign carved out a big enough niche for the Live Blade to remain a viable option in the American market from 1946 well into the 1960's.
Pictured below is the Gold version of the Live Blade that I once owned and used. The Stahly delivers a surprisingly non-aggressive, yet remarkably close shave, with little effort beyond the need to wind up the vibrating mechanism three or four times during the shave. It is this vibration that creates the ease of the shave. The base plate of the Stahly contains a platform for the standard double edge blade which is attached to its frame by a small spring on each end (see first picture below). The vibrating action causes this blade loaded platform to make 3000 side to side movements per second, which in turn allows the blade to slice through the whiskers much like a standard razor slices when using the "slide" stroke or how the standard stroke of a slant slices. As a soothing by-product, the vibration also delivers a calming face massage.
In addition to the four aforementioned plating versions, the Stahly was also produced in a Chrome/Black and Silver/Gold combinations.
Additional patent information on the Stahly Live Blade:
American patent No. 1760496 27 May 1930. Russel P. Harshberger, Chicago, Illinois. Also No 2054418 15 Sep 1936 filed 27 Apr 1934. Ilse Hartmann, NÅe Bohm, Stuttgart, Germany. Trademark first used 8 May 1942. Trademark filed 8 Jul 1947.
Manufacturer:
Stahly Inc., Division of Geuder, Paeschke and Frey Co., 320 N., 15th St., Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Any and all information about this razor is more than welcomed.
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