Suppose you ignored the standard logic about what makes a good hunting knife and started out with fresh ideas -- if you looked at what materials are available today and what the typical hunter's needs really are, you could come up with the Buck 693BK Alpha Hunter Gut Hook.
This 8-1/2-inch full tang knife, cut and ground from one piece of 420HC high carbon stainless steel, leaves part of the spine exposed above the black rubber handle slabs. Ridges ground into the back of the 3-3/4 inch blade and the butt of the knife's tang increase the user's grip by providing a non-slip surface for thumb pressure. The deeply hollow ground plain edge sharpens easily and cuts like a razor. The gut hook tip opens the abdominal cavity of animals without damaging the internal organs and tainting the meat. This is a fully functional and very practical modern knife, and the design even looks good.
The reason you didn't see a knife like this on the frontier may only be that the processes, materials, and needs weren't the same then. Smiths made excellent practical knives in those days, and many makers today still copy what they did. Made from today's materials for hunters who don't hunt for a living and do need the built-in skill of a gut hook, the Alpha Hunter doesn't just repeat what was best two hundred years ago. This is a fresh look at what makes a good hunting knife.
A well-made heavy black nylon belt sheath comes with the Alpha Hunter -- you might want to add a lanyard to the hole in the tang, and you'll need a honing slip to fit the gut hook notch.
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