doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Turn-of-the-century Price Comparisons

Interesting stuff. I'll be adding the 1908 Sears prices soon. Feel free to post additional information.
http://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1OTND2bQH0vhlbCf7c2sN8H1vzmT7xagUSXhewGB03SE

Thanks for the post. These old ads are always fun to look at!! If only you could go back in time with the money we have now. What a blast!

All the best!

Greg

It's almost not fair to get a man thinkin' that way. Talk about altering history. Oh, what a different world it would be.

For one, Stephen Grant may have never opened his own shop IF I could make that trip back in time - because Boss would still be busy - to this day, probably - filling my orders for pairs of side-snap, damascus-barreled hammerguns!!

Where's my Delorean?!

Drew: Thanks for posting the prices. I have often heard that the reason for the demise of the double gun after WWI was because of the "machine made" pumps and automatics, but it is evident from looking over these lists that the pumps and automatics cost more, not less than the doubles.

A few standard grade pumps from 1927

Marlin 43A - $50
Remington 17A - $47
Winchester 97 - $44
Winchester 12 - $51

Drew,

I recently started to compile data for a possible article based on who could afford a medium priced, $100 double gun, i.e. Parker DH, LC Smith Grade 3, in 1912 and today. What I'm finding is a rehash of my economics courses with too many variables!

One dollar in 1912 would be worth roughly $22.80 today via CPI. The $1 cousumer bundle, a group of goods everyone needs, is worth $45. But, one's average share of the GDP is $378!

In addition to determining what one could afford then and now is that manufacturing has changed. We can no longer hire cheap skilled labor as engravers but we do have CNC machining. How do these compare?

I started by using these comparison factors of what $1 in 1912 would be worth today:

$22.80 using the Consumer Price Index
$16.90 using the GDP deflator
$45.00 using the value of consumer bundle
$100.00 using the unskilled wage
$140.00 using the Production Worker Compensation
$117.00 using the nominal GDP per capita
$378.00 using the relative share of GDP

The above listed value comparisions are from the Measuring Worth website:
http://www.measuringworth.com/uscompare/

If anyone knows of other worth over time calculators on the web please post them.

So, I added the Parker Reproduction recent examples of what could be manufactured. Then, there are those $15,000 CSMC Foxes. The research is just starting.

Anyone care to comment?

Respectfully,
Mark

Just acquired a reprint of the 1936 Abercrombie & Fitch catalog. (I have a Sauer imported by A&F that year.) The interesting part is that some gun prices went down during the Depression. The Model 12, for example, lists for $39.50 in my catalog. But it was back up to $43.64 by 1940, according to my Shooters Bible.

Also interesting to compare prices back then vs now, on the used market. My Model 280 Sauer 20ga cost about $40 more than a Parker DHE back then. I think I paid a decent price for the Sauer, not a super bargain or a steal. But what I paid would not touch a DHE 20ga in decent shape today. (But would certainly buy a NIB 20ga Repro!)

I also had no idea Francottes were that pricey in 1936. $175 for a Knockabout with ejectors. That's just $11.50 under the DHE price.

More good stuff

In 1908, the hammerless No. 00 LC Smith with fluid steel barrels was sold by Sears for $25.00, compared to the $13.85 for hammerless Meriden gun.
Other doubleguns listed in the Sears catalogue:
Remington K Grade - $23.50
Ithaca Field Grade - $18.00
Baker Batavia Leader - $22.50
Winchester 97 - $20.00


Net prices for non-ejector hammerless double guns in the 1912 Schoverling, Daly & Gales, New York catalogue courtesy of David Noreen:

L.C. Smith No. 00 - $25
Fox Sterlingworth - $25
DS Grade Lefever - $25
Field Grade Ithaca - $19
Baker Batavia Special - $19
Manhatten Arms Co./ Fulton - $15
Stevens No. 335 - $15.85
Folsom/Crescent/American Gun Co. Knickerbocker - $13.50
N.R. Davis B.S. grade - $14
Hopkins & Allen - $15
Ejectors, if available, added $10 - $12.50 to the prices.

The 1915 Iver Johnson Sporting Goods catalogue (successors to John. P. Lovell, Boston and not to be confused with Iver Johnson Arms) courtesy of Daryl Hallquist:

Parker Trojan - $27.50
Fox Sterlingworth - $25.00
Ithaca Field - $19.00
Torkelson B Grade - $25.00
Stevens 335 - $16.50
Fulton - $17.50
Baker Black Beauty - $18.00
Lefever Durston Special - $25.00
Knox-All Hammerless (American Gun Co/Crescent) - $15.00
Iver Johnson - $18.00
Riverside Arms Co. (J. Stevens trade name) - $15.00

Curious also would be the price of a box of 25 shells as compared to today's prices.

There is a way of determining relative value by using a technique that my historian friends often employ. When doing economic research in the 18th and 19th centuries they use the annual salary of a clergyman as a measuring rod. Apparently that remained fairly constant in terms of buying power.

In the US we could use the salary of a member of congress; an Ivy-League professor; or a ship's captain as a metric. A working-man's income would be too regional and business-cycle dependent.

These kinds of embedded metrics do away with the more ambiguous calculations that MarkOue struggled with a few posts above.