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Moved from old YW site:
gschwertley
Not long ago, I got back from the gun range with one of my M95's. Normally, I take more than one weapon to the range. This is both for variety and in case one gun/ammo combination has problems, I haven't wasted my trip to the range. This time along with the afore-mentioned M95, I took my old Stevens Model 52 .22 caliber single shot.
The Stevens sure doesn't qualify as a military arm, although I did own it while I was in the army. I bought this gun from a pal for $5 in 1965. In addition to the open sights, it also has a Weaver B-4 rimfire scope mounted, although this is done via a sheet-metal, side-offset cheapie plainly marked "Japan". The mount is attached to the receiver with Ford carburetor fillister-head screws.
The Blue Book of Gun Values says this model rifle was made by Stevens from 1933 to 1937. Years ago when I bought it, I didn't know it was quite that old. It has a "4" stamped inside the receiver which is done in the same style of numeral that Snap-on Tools used to date their tools back then, so maybe this rifle was made in 1934.
Now how many things do you have around the house with more than one moving part that were made in 1934 and still work just as well now as when made? Most modern folks now probably couldn't put their hands on even one item in their house or apartment that was made in or around 1934, working or not. My case is different; I gravitate to older items, not newer ones. This Christmas for example, the hot item to have is something called an "I-Pod". The advertisers tell me I should have one. I don't even know what the devil an "I-Pod" is. If one fell on my foot, I wouldn't recognize it as such.
I have a number of old cars, the oldest being a 1940 Ford which my grand-dad bought new. It hasn't run since the last wedding in the family in October 2003; but if I went out there right now and made sure the 6 volt battery was charged, that car would start up and drive away.
Back to the Stevens .22. I took it to the range with a cup full of .22 shells that I had been saving up for years. I have bricks of fresh .22's, but oh no, we can't use those. The cup I have been saving are all those .22's that I find laying around on the ground in the woods and the desert, dropped by other shooters or rejected with primer strikes that didn't go off. Some were scratched from being walked on, etc. Well, these were the shells that I decided to use up checking out the zero on my Stevens. They did well, for the most part. Out of about 130 or so, only about 10 or 12 failed to ignite. The rifle fired tiny groups, and once re-zeroed, poured them right into the center of the target at 30 meters.
Dang, I don't know why, but I have a lot more fun with clunker guns than I do with the few fancy ones I own.
TNGunsmoke
Ain't it the truth. Hmm, now I gotta go see if I can scrounge up an old 22 somewhere.
yockey5
Been shooting the .22s since childhood and coon hunting days and I too also love them yet.
nam barney
(12/18/04 6:29 pm)
GS
You're not alone when it comes to picking up stray 22 ammo. I do it all the time and use it in my High Standard Nickle Plated Double-Nine with about the same ratio if missfires. But for everyone that goes 'crack' its money in the bank
I don't have a rifle as old as yours but I still use the Marlin 81 that my big sister gave me for my 16th. birthday. Still shoots great too.
Nam
mikmarjon
I have a savage stevens 410 over and under that I 've had since I was 8 that was built in 55 the same year I was born. It was my first gun and I got it for Christmas.Stevens single shot 22.s are in my opinion one of the best ever built.
gschwertley
NB:
Many moons ago, I had a High Standard Sentinel, a 9 shot .22 caliber shall we say, "economy" revolver. I had it when I was 15 and it was one of my first handguns. If we wanted to shoot it at night in the suburbs where I lived, we crawled down into the concrete storm drains, got to the main chambers where you could almost stand up, and with a flash light fired away at targets we set up. It was a good enough gun to have fun with, but that can be said of just about any gun that shoots! It looked good to the untrained 15-year-old eye, kinda like a "real" po-leece gun. I learned later of course that High Standard made nicer automatics (some military) than many of their revolvers.
Kar98AZfan
Don't know how old it is,as it was my dads,but I still have the single shot Marlin I learned to shoot with. And yes ,I use .22 pick up's too.GS, I don't think anyone makes guns or cars the way they used to.Maybe some day I'll get around to getting the Willy's MB running again -TR
gschwertley
At the gun range where I am a member, they have recently put out a bucket that shooters can use to dispose of dud rounds, dented rounds, etc. They want to discourage people throwing the stuff out into the range area where it may become comingled with empty brass. Anyway, I always take a look in this bucket before I leave and scavenge anything that has any remote value in it, like, can I shoot it as is, is the bullet still good, etc.
yockey5
I pick up any boxer brass and unfired .22s when I am at the range. This way I keep adding to the brass that I may never use!
A square 10
have posted before about it but i too have an old revolver-trapper h&r that was my fathers , he claimed to have won it in a raffle in the thirtys , no reason to disbelieve it - i take it along every trip for just the same reason , shoot up those "pennys" others are to flush to stoop and pick up , and i keep a box in the bag all the time as well , i generaly shoot the rifles but the handgun is fun, have an old highstandard sportking too but its a bit more finniky
gschwertley
A Square: That reminds me of the story about the land my wife's grandpa won in a card game. He was a jeweler in Los Angeles and sometime in the late 1930's, he won some desert land in the Chocolate Mountains east of the Salton Sea in southern California. When WW2 got under way, the Navy came around and said something like "Mr. Gilson, we know you are a patriotic American and we need you to donate your land so we can use it as part of an air gunnery range. We'll deed it back to you when we are finished with it". They did not say, "when the war is over". They said, "when we are finished with it". You can look on any road map of California for yourself; the Chocolate Mountain Aerial Gunnery Range is still there. Mr. Gilson got snookered by the Navy.
He also had some other desert land north of Los Angeles. He got snookered out of this property in the 1970's by another government agency, the Bureau of Land Management. They put a fence up around his land and said "we are turning this area into a tortoise preserve".
"We are from the government and we're here to help you".
A square 10
goes to show , dont buy swamps and sandpiles the govment will find an unfortunate species who needs it more , bunch of folks locally - other side of the mississippi -are going to get an offer they cant refuse for their homes cause we need a new bridge , there is only six of them in about twenty miles here , i wonder if they will dig up anything that could slow construction - its going right thru an area the indians used as encampment in the early days here
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