Reg Cooper was born in Sheffield in 1931.  His father died when he was only five years old.  Aged 14, he found a job as an errand boy at John Clarke & Son.  Later he was employed in the warehouse, and then worked his way up to production manager.  Reg recalled (to the author) that when he joined, the firm employed about forty workers on Mowbray Street and was a thriving business.   One of the best customers was the Scouts’ Association, which ordered 30,000 sheath knives a year.  In 1970, personnel changes at Clarke’s led Reg to leave and start making knives himself.  He next spent over thirty years working in Egerton Lane (in premises opposite Beehive Works).  Reg then moved in about 2006 to Norfolk Barracks.  He later shared an upper-storey workshop with the late Trevor Ablett in Edmund Road.  While Trevor made folding knives, Reg concentrated on his speciality – Bowie knives.  They were hand-crafted in various sizes, with handles of buffalo horn, stag, and wood.  Reg and Trevor appeared in Great British Railway Journeys with Michael Portillo (Series 2, Episode 14, screened BBC 2 on 22 June 2012).   Their partnership and friendship ended with Trevor’s death in 2015.