Safety Razor of the Month, September 2012 - Military Sets

[alex2363]

GOOD topic chosen! This is interesting and as usual I have questions. Yes the Gillette company won the Big contract in WW1. For the U.S forces that is.
I guess that the central powers must had the same need for close protecions. What razors were protecing their men from the gas??

Here is another one; yep the Gillette had the grand contract but GEM was still a competitor. I guess as part from the adverts we see "now" they ran a "aggressive" campaign towards the civilians and the soldiers that "had an option". Any comments of this?
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Well GEM was still relevant and many users were not yet adjusted to the DE shave yet or did not like it. There were still many lovers of GEM/SE razors back in the war time. As a matter of fact, even today there are still many SE lovers and B&B has recently added a SE only forum because of it.

 

[alex2363]

Now we are getting somewhere ELSE. Spectacular Porter!

Yes, Porter never ceases to amaze and educate, love it!!

 

[alex2363]

I would be interested to know when the shift back to personal item from issue item happened also. They are hard to find, but there are currently military issue DE razors. I'm not sure if they are issued to GIs or to civilians in disaster areas (Katrina, Issac, etc).

Bradley, How do you know this?

 

[alex2363]

Here is a Khaki Set I recently acquired. Serial J764, which I believe is 1919. Property of the US Army stamped on khaki case, and on the the underside of the blade guard. I also have a booklet that details various things about the Armed Forces including salutes, ranks, and types of vessels.

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Yes, the J series is 1918-19 , K is 1919-20

 

[alex2363]

GOOD topic chosen! This is interesting and as usual I have questions. Yes the Gillette company won the Big contract in WW1. For the U.S forces that is.
I guess that the central powers must had the same need for close protecions. What razors were protecing their men from the gas??

Here is another one; yep the Gillette had the grand contract but GEM was still a competitor. I guess as part from the adverts we see "now" they ran a "aggressive" campaign towards the civilians and the soldiers that "had an option". Any comments of this?

Porter stated this:
But there were military sets -- double- and single-edged -- from plenty of other makers and from other eras, too.

 

[packtray]

(Old thread, I know)

The military got out of the issued razor business after Vietnam. There are still razors to be found in Health and Comfort Packs (the NSNs elude me at present), but those are various disposables.

I would be interested to know when the shift back to personal item from issue item happened also. They are hard to find, but there are currently military issue DE razors. I'm not sure if they are issued to GIs or to civilians in disaster areas (Katrina, Issac, etc).

 

[packtray]

Fun fact: Gem and Gillette sets had the same stock number in the Quartermaster catalog during WW2!

Porter stated this:
But there were military sets -- double- and single-edged -- from plenty of other makers and from other eras, too.