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One of the first things I did was go through their catalog and choose the sword that could most easily serve as a base for a Lady Vivamus replica. I finally settled on their reproduction of a Confederate Staff & Field Officer's Sword (as seen above). It is very similar in design to the 1852 Navy dress sword and it has a 31 inch long blade, as Heinlein specified in his letter. It seemed to me that only minor changes were needed to turn this into a very faithful reproduction of Lady Vivamus.

Unfortunately, Windlass decided that because of licensing issues and the admittedly small market of Heinlein fans, producing a Lady Vivamus replica was not a viable project at that time. I could not really argue with their reasoning but it was a major disappointment. However, the licensing VP with whom I'd been working had ordered a sword with a plain blade from their factory in India that I was going to turn into a prototype for them. When they canceled the project, they sold me that sword at a discount.