calsfoundation@cals.org
January 26, 2011
James Black, an early cutler and blacksmith in Washington (Hempstead County), claimed to have made the knife later made famous by Jim Bowie. This claim was first documented in print in a local newspaper in 1841. As a result, Black became well known, and his knife was widely copied. Black lived in the house shown here when, in 1835, shortly after the death of his wife, his father-in-law broke in and nearly beat him to death with a club. Black, left almost blind, lived the rest of his life in Washington, dying in 1872.