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 "Jim Ferguson's amazing Damascus, that he custom makes for me, always blows me away and gives me all kinds of inspiration… but this time, his mastery almost made me want to check into a mental hospital! I unpacked the Damascus that was to become "Between Heaven and Hell" and was totally jazzed by the patterns. Even though the steel was in its raw state, unshaped and
unrefined, the I could already see that the patterns were dramatic, almost violent, and I knew I had the makings for another very special dagger.
I thought all night about what I would do with it. You see, daggers are one of my all time favorite to make. I've always found their shape and power and "lines" to be totally sexy. Now most people will think I'm crazy to put the word "sexy" with "dagger"… but believe me, real knife collectors know exactly what I mean! In the morning I got up with all kinds of ideas for a new dagger… but couldn't find the Damascus! I looked and looked… found other steels, including a beautiful "tranquil" patterned steel, but not the one I saw the night before. I gave up for the moment, and went out for my daily walk.
While I was out, my Grandson who is learning the trade, had come into my studio to work on a few of his own projects. When I came back, he greeted me by showing me the Damascus I was looking for! He said how amazing it was and wondered what I was going to do with it. I asked him where he found it, and he said: "Right here, Grandpa!" Then pointed where I had been searching all morning. The mystery was solved… I'm ashamed to say, very simply, when he turned the steel over, and I saw, that the other was the "tranquil" pattern! I had inadvertently turned the steel over the night before and thus thought it was a totally different Damascus. Now patterns in Damascus are always different, but rarely have I seen such totally opposite patterns, creating such diametrically different emotions.
I immediately thought of a wonderful story that my High School French teacher, Miss Hill, gave to me. I used to stay after school to help her, (yes, I had a crush on her that lasts to this day!) and she gave me an old novella as a gift. It was called "Entre le ciel et l'enfer", which means "Between Heaven And Hell". Miss Hill knew of my fascination with knives, and that I had started making them, so the story really got to me. It was about a man who is given a dagger by a mysterious woman. One side of the blade had images of heaven, and the other, of hell. He was told that the dagger would be his savior, or his enemy, depending on which blade faced him when he used it. The whole idea is how quickly we can turn our lives and our actions from good to evil with the twist of a "blade" always haunted me. I loved the story, and had always wanted to make a dagger like the one in the book. Now, with this staggering Damascus, I had the materials!
A knife, both realistically and symbolically does indeed have the ability to make a perfect cut… a separation between what is right and wrong. I can't think of a better dagger to demonstrate that than "Between Heaven And Hell"!
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