Does the history of a gun mean much to you?

[Bushman]

Either this is the same kind of rifle that got the Jordan Buck or fought in WW1 or... Or it could be personal history like this was grandpa's rifle or this was my first gun that I bought with my own money; that kind of thing. A friend of mine went to a gun show and a guy was asking more for a rifle because it was a "proven rifle" what ever that is. If you were going to sell off a gun, how do you determine which one goes and which one stays? I'm wrestling with that dilemma with my first shotgun now that it has some dark family history connected with it.

[Bill Gunn]

it has some dark family history connected with it.

Dark History = Out The Door without a problem.
Inherited with memories.., I have a real problem getting rid of those. I sold a Ruger 3 screw Convertible (I had one of my own), and a Remington Mod 37 .22 target gun of my Dads' after he died because I have 2 Anschutz that I can target shoot or hunt with, but it was very tough to do. I have other guns he gave me that I kept.

Here's a picture of him with the Remington from back in the early 50's..

Front Row center...

I sold The Remington to my cousin, his Dad's in the picture below too, 2nd from left, top row . You can't see it, but he shot a Winchester 52.



http://pic90.picturetrail.com/VOL2250/777751/1527241/368158908.jpg

[bugsNbows]

If the gun is well built, correctly suited to it's intended function, shoots and looks good, then I'll keep it. If not, bye bye. Some just feel right and some don't.

[Badger]

Bushman,

Perhaps there is "some dark family history associated with a shotgun", so what? The gun did not do anything wrong-it was the user who did the dark stuff. Sarah Brady is known for PUNISHING GUNS!

I appreciate firearms history and that is why I collect military arms. I often wonder who in the past handled, cleaned, used and cussed the arms now in my collection. Surely some of the arms have been used for lots of stuff. Whatever?

Badger

[southtexas]

Maybe the "dark family history" is that it won't shoot a group less than 4"...

[Gil Martin]

If there is sentimental value associated with a firearm, then it is probably a keeper. If it is well made or from a historic period, again it is likely a keeper.

Dark family history involving a firearm and what to do with it is a personal preference decision. I have the handgun that my son used to commit suicide. It is in a gun safe and will stay there. All the best...
Gil

[Alan R McDaniel Jr]

Well said Gil. Sorry for your loss. Hope none of us have to deal with those issues with our guns, but those that do can take a lesson from your example.

I have some guns that I will keep for my lifetime. I will try and impress upon those who get them after me the importance that I place on them. There are some things in this world that are not for sale. No amount of money would replace them. The guns that I have were given to me, inherited, or bought and paid fer. I never bought a one of them with the intention of selling it. I have sold two in my lifetime and traded two. I wish I had one of them back but I traded it for a rifle that I wouldn't trade now.

Different folks have different ideas about guns. What is the most important to remember is that they are just "things" and regardless of the sentimental attachment that we may place on them they are, in the end, whether tools or works of art, "Things". All of us who own guns, and use guns, particularly hunters, become attached to our firearms. We rely on them to do the jobs for which they were intended. Over the course of History we have staked our survival and our lives on our firearms. No person can put such reliance on a "Thing" and not become attached to it to a greater or lesser degree.

There are those who would have us deny this attachment. They have likely never pitted themselves against nature or staked their lives or survival on anything and that's a pity. They will never know if they can or not and are destined to fearful existence.

Alan

[jbmi]

Back around 1999 I wanted to do something different with a 308 Winchester Model 88 I owned. I asked here on the Campfire for some ideas. A poster name Carl Crocker from MO. mentioned an article in an old Rifle Magazine (May-June 1974) about a gentleman in Alaska by the name of Roy Smith that rebored his 88 from a 308 to a 338-08. Carl was kind enough to send me the copy of the magazine. After reading the article I knew this is exactly what I wanted to do.

Later, I also asked on here who you would recommend to do the rebore job and I was told Richard Nickle from Eatonville WA. was the man I need for the job. I contacted Richard and he said he would be glad to do it but it would be the first 88 he did in this caliber, he had done numerous other calibers but looked forward to this one.
I sent the barreled action to him in August of 2000 and gave him the spec's I read about in the Rifle article . I wanted my gun to be the same as Roy Smiths. Richard said he would complete the job by the end of the year.
Around the holidays I called Richard to see if it was done, he said it was just about complete but would like to wait till after New Years to send it back so it would not get lost in the Christmas rush. I did not hear back from him the entire month of January so I called. His son answered and informed me his father passed away while working on it just after I spoke with him. The rifle was not yet complete but he would, with my permission, send it to Cliff LaBounty in Maple Falls WA for the few things left to do. (re-crown it, check head space, and stamp the barrel with the new caliber). I received the finished product in March of 2000. It was a tack driver.

In the mean time I contacted Fajen looking for a stock to put on the rifle when I got it back. Fajen said they no longer made this stock but had one last semi-finished semi-fancy walnut blank in stock they would sell me. Deal was made stock was sent.

I have posted a picture of this rifle numerous times on the campfire, the last one being about a month ago when a question was asked about scope mounts on an 88. It was during this post that Rick Smith asked me where I bought the stock. I said it was from the Fajen but the company was no longer in business and to try Wenig. He did and found out he could get a new replacement stock for his 88 from them.

Rick then e-mailed me to thank me for the info and told me the story about his father who built the very same rifle I did back in the 70's. It was such a success that he wrote an article about it that was published in Rifle Magazine back in 1974. His fathers name was Roy Smith

I wrote back to Rick that is was his fathers article that made me do what I did and I had the gunsmith follow exactly how his dad had it done. Rick was really taken back by this chain of coincidences and would relay this story back to his father who was hospitalize. He also said his brother still hunts with the original rifle.

Today Rick e-mailed me to tell me his father died peacefully last Friday. I hope they had a chance to tell him about my rifle and his connection to it.

This Campfire is a great place isn't it.

The rifle that is very special to me because of all the people and events connected to it:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v460/jbmich/IMG_0480.jpg

[Altjaeger]

Since I grew up in a family of non-hunters/shooters I can't say I have much that was passed on. My father still had an old Savage double barrel 16 ga that was left from when he gave hunting a short try in the 1940s. That was the only gun I had for the first few years and it killed a deer, ducks, dove, quail, rails, coots, rabbits, coons, water mocassins and a few not quite so legal things like meadow larks (they got eaten right along with the quail) back in the 1960s. Basically any thing that was a possible target in those teen years. I still have it in the back of the safe.

I also have a M70 push feed bought in 1968 at the age of 16. The rifle, , a Weaver V4.5, sling and case was $168 as I recall amounting to a month's wages. That rifle was my only centerfire for almost 25 years taking whitetail, roe deer, fallow deer. red deer and a mouflon. It was carried on a couple of mule deer and an elk hunt, but never fired. It will go nowhere until my son inherits it.

Thats about it for personal history. I will write more later.

[LampLighter]

Anything in .308 goes out the door, if it even comes in the door.

I usually do not get attached to any firearm. I have sold quite a few. I doubt though that I would ever sell my Ruger 44 magnum carbine, semi auto. I think the Ruger 22/45 4 inch is here to stay too. I just came inside from shooting it. I was yelling at the target again to "get back" just before unleashing 3 quick rounds from the back pocket. :rolleyes:

[ncboman]

Does the history of a gun mean much to you?

Means a great deal to me. :)

I have a couple that fit into the 'just another gun' category until the people that previously owned and/or shot them comes to light. ;)

[Altjaeger]

As I said I bought my first centerfire rifle in 1968. That old .30-06 served me well many years.

In 1990 I bought a Savage 110 in .308 at a garage sale. In 1991 I killed a roebuck with it that dropped so fast I wondered were it went. It had gone straight down into the grass where it stood. Then I put it away and went back to my '06 until my son claimed it a few years later proving it equally effective on a number of whitetails plus several feral hogs including a scale weighed 230 lbs boar.

In 1991 I bought a Santa Barbara commercial mauser in 7x57 because of the classic action and round. I killed a big 19 point Red Deer with it the next year using 170 grain Lapau ammo. Between my son and I it has claimed whitetail and hogs since using 140 grain Core-Lokts.

Next was a pre-64 Winchester M88 in .308 because I had coveted a friends in .284 back in the 1960s, plus again it was becoming a "classic". My left handed wife claimed it before I killed with it, but has shown its effectiveness on deer and hogs. Since then I have bought an early 1920s production Savage 99 stamped .250-3000, a 1931 production Husqvarna at Jack Belks urging chambered in the 9.3x57 (Swedes called it the "potato chucker"), an Oberndorf K98 that has been sporterized in the 1930s style style in 8x57 and others. None newer than the 1973 Marlin 336 I bought a few years ago because I had never owned a .30-30 carbine. All have killed deer for us except the Husqvarna.

Truth is I have no interest in current production guns unless it was a Winchester M70 featherweight, but that is a classic style. They just don't excite me. I can't say I have a hunger for much except what I have, but perhaps a classic will popup and grab me. :)

[LampLighter]

that dropped so fast I wondered were it went.


:D

[Bill Gunn]

[QUOTE=Altjaeger;6405] In 1991 I killed a roebuck with it that dropped so fast I wondered were it went. QUOTE]

:) :)

I had that happen in Pa. when I shot a deer with my 6.5X55 at 80 yards. After the shot I was quickly looking all over for the deer, and was very upset when I had no idea where to go look for it. Then a head slowly rose up out of a depression it had been standing in. A shot to the neck finished it.

[Smokey]

I have several guns that were family guns which I would never consider selling. Additionally there are several I purchased that fall in the same class. For me sentiment is a big deal and I like it that way.

An example, I have an old Stevens single shot 12ga shotgun worth maybe $60. Around 20 years ago a collector offered me $200 for the gun. I got the gun at a S&H Green Stamp store for I think one and a half books. I was in school when I got the gun and have used it every year. There is no way I would consider selling this gun.

[dave-t.]

I have inherited one old shotgun from my grandfather, an 1897 winchester 12g. I'll always have it.

The only other gun that I really covet was owned by my other grandfather, it is a pre '64 winchester m94 30-30 that looks brand new, my grandad, my dad, and I have killed deer with it. I'd trade any rifle I have for it, but I know that when dad is through with it, it will come to me.

I regret selling my first .22. It was a common semi auto Marlin, a youth model that had a repaired stock, didn't cycle that well, and was on it's 3rd replacement tube, but I bought it myself and pretty much learned to hunt and shoot with that gun. Sold it to a pawn shop for $40 so I could get something better.

I've bought and sold a few guns, but in general if a gun is 'a good one' I'll keep it regardless of how much I actually use it.