U.S. Military Knives, by M.H. Cole, Book I, II, III, IV Original Line Drawings Value?

[Richard Turner]

I have about 80% of the hand drawn line drawings that Mr. Cole used to first publish Books I, II, III, and IV. I purchased these from Mrs. Cole after Mr. Cole passed away. Most drawings are considerably larger than the pages in the books, with most being to scale. Mr. Cole gave many of the drawings away to collectors who had allowed him to borrow knives to be included in the books. Many of the drawings were used several times in the various books, with hand notes to the publisher for page changes and inclusion into each subsequent book. Several have actual magazine advertisements depicting surplus knives and manufacturer's ads, that Mr. Cole glued in place for printing in the books. All of the drawings are in pencil.

Question: I am contemplating selling some or all of the drawings and have no idea as to their value, or how/where to market them. Do not really want to put them up on ebay, but that may be the best venue to realize the best price.

Any suggestions as to marketing or value?

Regards,

Richard

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A little history of how I became acquainted with Mr. Cole.

Here are a couple of photos. (This is the only photo of these scabbards I have at this time and the workmanship has improved greatly since then). The first one is of an early M6 scabbard with a refinished Camillus M3 Blade Marked repro and a Marine Raider Stilletto Scabbard with a Camillus repro stilletto. The second photo is of Mr. Howard Cole and myself. Both photos are circa late 1991 at my first saddle shop in Clay, AL, which was a full retail saddle and harness shop. I had contacted Mr. Cole while I was still living in Fallbrook, Ca, when I was first getting started in 1989. I was surprised to find out that he only lived about 10 miles from where I grew up. I told him that I was leaving the Corps and returning home to set up shop.

Once I returned home in June 1991, Mr. Cole and I became good friends and he visited the shop often. I did quite a bit of work for Mr. Cole, sewing several of his military scabbards as well as making a few scabbards for the Skinning Knife Book he was then working on. I felt honored to have known such an interesting and knowledgeable gentleman and that he included some of my work in the Skinning Knife Book. Even though he was always welcome anytime, he always called and never showed up unannounced. We spent many hours talking about knives, both military as well as skinning and hunting knives. He really enjoyed watching the old Randall harness stitcher run. He said it sounded like a freight train. I told him that from the research I had done, this was one of the primary stitchers that Rock Island Arsenal, Enger Kress, Boyt, Milwaukee Saddlery, and many other contractors used during WWI and WWII. This particular machine is a first year of Mfg., and was made in 1910. I had it completely rebuilt just before Mr. Cole and I met.
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