In writing his autobiography, Always the Young Strangers, Carl Sandburg recalled the scissors grinder coming along Berrien Street, ringing his bell. It was a signal to the homemakers that they could get their scissors sharpened. In those days, most women made their own clothes, shirts for their husbands and outfits for their children. Cutting all that fabric tended to dull their scissors.

The dark-haired man who came to sharpen scissors on the street carried a wooden frame on his back which included a round grinding stone. It had a treadle which he operated with his foot to rotate the wheel. The blades of the scissors were held against the stone to put a new edge on each one. Sparks flew from the wheel which fascinated the children.

When the man was finished sharpening the scissors, he said, “Tenna cents,” to the householder. The two words may have been the most important of the few words in English that he knew. Being a street merchant may have been his first step on the ladder of success for an immigrant from Italy. The price of sharpening the scissors would be $2.55 in today's money. It would not be a way to earn a living wage in today's economy.

Scissors and knives produced in the nineteenth century were of steel, but of lesser quality than today. Their sharpness was more difficult to maintain. Blades became thinner with each grinding and eventually the metal would snap in two.

The homemaker using her kitchen knives daily would pass the knife edge over a honing steel or a whetstone made especially for the purpose. It restored the edge for cutting vegetables and slicing meat.

Men of the household kept their straight razors sharp in order to cut their whiskers with as little pressure as possible, thus avoiding bloodletting. They stropped the razor on a leather strop impregnated with a fine abrasive. It helped realign the edge molecules and shine the blade.

Axes were sharpened to ease the labor of chopping wood for the kitchen stove. The angle of the edge was not nearly so thin as the scissors or knives.

Care was taken to keep razors, scissors and knives in good condition. They were cleaned immediately after use. They were stored in a case so the edges wouldn't be damaged.

The sharpening of tools to a fine edge by a street merchant is not commonly done today. Some expressions of an earlier time persist. For example, men prefer a “knife edge crease” in their trousers on formal occasions. Certainly, they would not readily give up their electric shavers for a straight razor.