Stiletto was used by anarchists as well as by members of various "Black Hand" (a method of extortion) organizations to assassinate Italian-Americans and others who either opposed the "Black Hand" or ignored its demands for blackmail. The "Black Hand" even established schools for training its members in the use of the stiletto. The emergence of fierce hand-to-hand combat in the trenches of World War I created a new need for stabbing weapons, resulting in the reappearance of the dagger and the stiletto. Many versions of these stabbing knives exist, some individually made by soldiers, while others were government-procured and authorized. On
Stiletto heel in the mainstream shops. A version of the stiletto heel was reintroduced in 1974 by Manolo Blahnik, who dubbed his "new" heel the "Needle". Similar heels were stocked at the big Biba store in London, by Russell & Bromley and by smaller boutiques. Old, unsold stocks of pointed-toe stilettos and contemporary efforts to replicate them (lacking the true stiletto heel because of changes in the way heels were by then being mass-produced) were sold in street fashion markets and became popular with punks and with other fashion "tribes" of the late 1970s until supplies of the inspirational original styles dwindled