Clauss Cutlery Company opener. Clauss Cutlery Company Clauss Cutlery is a cutlery brand owned by the Acme United Corporation since 2004. It was founded as Elyria Shear Works in 1877 by John and Henrie Clauss in Elyria, Ohio. At one time the company was the largest manufacturer of scissors and shears in the world. The two brothers John and Henrie Clauss, of German origin, started Elyria Shear Works from a one-room building in Elyria, Ohio. Together with five employees, they began manufacturing scissors, shears, straight razors and serrated kitchen knives. In the early 1880s, with his shear business prospering, John Clauss planned a
Henry D. Messer the group under a pseudonym, which was the most common practice for members of the organization at that time. Messer also participated in the Stonewall riots of 1969. Around 1970, Messer and House hosted a meeting with Mattachine members and New York City Councilman Eldon R. Clingan, where the members of the organization shared their firsthand accounts of discrimination with the city leader. Clingan and Councilman Carter Burden introduced a bill in 1971, which Messer helped author, that would have prohibited discrimination in employment and housing on the basis of sexual orientation in New York City. The bill was unsuccessful