A recap (just for my own sanity). Entry level Smith guns from the beginning (using John Houchins 2006 LC Smith book):
For clarity, we'll ignore hammer guns and the early three-barrel guns.
LC Smith, Syracuse, New York: Quality 2 Gun, $80 (1886-1889)
LC Smith, Fulton, New York: Quality 1 Gun (Transitional), $60 (1890-1892)
LC Smith, Fulton, New York: Quality 1 Gun, 1893-1895, price on request? ($60 is mentioned elsewhere)
No. 1 Gun, 1892-1913, $60 (Houchins mentions two start dates for the No. 1 guns, 1892 and 1895). Confusing.
No. 0 Gun, 1895-1913, $47
No. 00 Gun, 1898-1913, $25
Hunter Arms Company Fulton Gun, 1915-1945, $22.85 (Not an Elsie sidelock, but a Smith doublegun all the same).
LC Smith sidelock hammerless guns started out as mostly hand-made guns in 1886 and then evolved to being almost completely mass-produced & machine-made guns (with exceptions being made for the higher grade guns) by the 1940s. These entry-level Smith guns were competing in the market with both domestic (Parker Trojans, Ithaca Flues, Fox Sterlingworths, etc.) and imported guns.
President Woodrow Wilson signed the Underwood Tariff Act in 1913 (the polar-opposite of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930), reducing import tariffs and flooding the domestic gun market with cheap European imports (this is likely what caused the Hunter Brothers to significantly modify operations at Fulton, further streamlining the mass-production component of their products).
All this begs the question... how does one differentiate a "fine" gun from a farm implement, i.e., a mere "tool", eh? Most would agree that "fine" doubleguns are largely handmade (with exceptions now for modern CNC technology being used to streamline production at even the most prestigious English gun firms). But...how is that so different from what Hunter Arms did in 1913?
Last edited by Lloyd3; 03/17/24 07:19 PM.
