Onion, Ken
In November of 1991, Ken Onion began making knives under the guidance of Stan Fujisaka. After his first session with Mr. Fujisaka, Ken knew he was hooked and ordered his Burr King grinder. Ken has always been fascinated by high speed machinery with precision tolerances. His background as a jet mechanic in the Marine Corps. and later as a robot mechanic helped to hone his technical skills. Furthermore, Ken is blessed with a talent for design. The combination of these two gifts set the groundwork for the creation of the SPEED SAFE mechanism in 1997.
The youngest ever inductee into the Blade Magazine Hall of Fame in 2008, he is recognized as one of the most innovative and successful knife designers of all time. In 1996 he created the first commercially successful assisted opening mechanism, and 20 years later unveiled his award-winning Field Strip Technology. As the designer of the successful Eros™ folder series, as well as the award-winning Hi Jinx™, Ken never seems to be at a loss for ideas.