doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Pedersen Custom Gun Co.

JayCee:
That's the gun !!!! Of course, the gun has no finish at all. I have been in touch with a friend to see about some engraving and was thinking about something like is being done to Joshua's Beretta.
Thanks for the pics. They say it all.
Best,
John
PS---One thing that is a boon with my gun is the wood. It has quite a bit of figure and is well laid out. This makes sense if they were supposed to be custom guns when finished.

John, glad to help. I miss my S-57E. Great gun, a bit on the light side for the volume
dove shooting we had back then (not at all similar to Argentina, but you could do
away with 250 shells in a short matinee).

JC(AL)

The very first few O/U guns that Pedersen (Mossberg) showed were actually made up for them by Lefevers Gun Shop in NY. I don't recall right now who's barreled action was used, but they were stocked and engraved at Lefevers for Pedersens. Only a few (less than 5) were made up. That was in late '70,,early '71. They were engraved in an oakleaf style. The first Pedersen produced guns were made up on Beretta O/U barreled actions imported in the white in 12 and 20ga. They were totally unmarked and had to be stamped in the forend clearance cut of the frame with a 'Made In Italy' hand stamp. All other markings were added by the engraver, at least on the early guns. Also, for some reason, Beretta did not permit Pedersen to use the Beretta trigger guard so a home grown replacement was produced at Mossberg. The Pedersen facility was a small building adjacent and to the rear of the main Mossberg mfg. facility at North Haven, Ct. Stocks were preturned by Wysoski Bros.(sp) also of Ct but I do not remember the town. Fitting, finishing, checkering was 'in house'. The first checkerers to work there were a husband and wife team,,Harold and Mildred Arthur. They had been doing freelanz checkering for most all of the gun factorys in the MA and CT area since WW2. Most of their work was for Winchester (M21 & M12). Harold did work at Winchester in the wood room at one time, I believe it was before WW2. They were fast, production checkerers and were able to work as well as teach several other people how to checker. Hot blueing needs were met by using the Mossberg facilitys. Rust blueing was set up in the Pedersen shop, but not without a battle. Engraving was at first sent out, mostly to Ralph Alpen in Cincinatti. He then shortly there after joined the company and moved to the area and set up a shop in the Pedersen facilty. He along with local engraver George B. Spring Jr. set up their engraving dept. and several apprentice engravers were started along. Geo. Spring had been both a feelanz and factory engraver in the area. His son later entered the art (I do not know if he ever worked at Pedersen) and was at one time a Colt Custom Shop Engraver. The Arambrerri line was a straight import from Spain, being only unboxed, inspected, put into a Pedersen case with accessorys and resold. Many were rejected upon inspection for visual as well as mechanical defects. Pedersen also used the Mossberg centerfire rifle (model 800?) as a line, fitting it up with a custom stock and offering it with engraving, etc. One was made up and given to USSR Prm. L. Bresniev. Seems to me it was a .338 cal. I think the first time the Pedersen line was shown to the public was the NSGA Show in 1971 or 1972. (NSGA was the National Sporting Goods Assn Show and was the forunner of the SHOT Show). When the Pedersen project folder, everything was sold and empolyees could buy remaining guns, barreled actions, parts, stocks, etc. The 'in the white' Pedersen probably came from that time. More than you ever wanted to know about Pedersen.....

It was a BL-4 with custom finished stock to customer's specifications. The thing with all bells und whistles cost $1800 ca. 1975. Gee, I wonder why that operation went belly up.
Modern equivalent is Cole Gunsmithing.
PS. Thanks Kutter, now that setup rivals cottage gun industry of Liege, Suhl, or Zella-Mehlis!

Agree, they were indeed BL-4 equiv. Berettas. I still have one 20 bbl'd action in the white from when the remains of the venture was sold. The individual who bought all remaining unfinished Peterson stock was a relative, though mine was purchased direct from the party that brokered that deal. Most all of those guns went on to be finished out by assorted smiths around the country, and I have seen a very wide spectrum of quality on some of those guns. Beretta delivered the bbl'd actions to Pederson sans the trigger guard as previously mentioned and the forearm hardware & hangers as well, in some instances. All that I saw were packaged in the same white cardboard Beretta boxes exactly as a BL of the time period was being shipped in, but they were not stocked, nor finished. Perhaps this adds a bit more to the story and available information.

"1800 dollars in 1975 had the same buying power as 6915.14 current dollars."

This from:
http://futureboy.homeip.net/fsp/dollar.fsp

JC(AL)

Is there any doubt that this BBS is a highly respected and an invaluable resource for gun people everywhere?
Ask, and the answers are provided in abundance.
Best,
John

John, Great find. For some additional info, I recall an early DGJ article on Beretta that mentioned some of the rare models. Think the 57, 56 models were mentioned. I had a Beretta S-56E from 1972 till I sold it in 2002 to buy a SXS. Wish that deal hadn't happened. Randy

Those S-series guns with E make pretty good bird guns. In my neck of primordial forest they go for about $1000+/-100, if in excellent condition, not bad at all.

PS. Thanks Kutter, now that setup rivals cottage gun industry of Liege, Suhl, or Zella-Mehlis! [/quote]
>
It probably would have worked if there wasn't so much friction between the Pedersen people and the Mossberg front office. Mossberg just couldn't understand why the guns couldn't be produced just like the ones being made in the big factory next door ,,,with the same methods and in the same time constraints. They looked, frowned, and shook their heads every time they saw someone actually hand sanding a stock or polishing metal. At one point they moved two large (3ft dia. wheel) double buffers into to shop to improve the speed of metal polishing! Those things were down right scary just to be near, let alone the damage an unskilled in their use operator could do to a piece of metal. I'm sure they had too big of a wheel on buffers that ran at too high RPM's. Scrap Mossberg lever action rifle receivers (looked like a Marlin) were used as practice pieces for the unfortunate ones chosen to go forward into the field of Master Polisher. That didn't last long. A few torn fingers and hands, receivers rocketed through the makeshift plywood backstop and that was the end of that. There were plenty of other adventures in gunmaking there though. There was an Argentinian that was a former Colt Industries Defense Dept Weapons specialist that Mossberg hired and assigned to us to help get the project moving. His claim to fame was cold blueing the Beretta O/U barrels. Not cold rust blueing,,just cold blueing. Gee,,they looked just great....And come to think of it,, the building was kind of like a cottage, inside and out!!