The Ithaca SxS was a big departure from the gun Homer shot prior to going to work for Lou Smith. He shot a 30" pre war Browning superposed trap gun with light barrels. The gun had the low step 7/16" rib Browning advertised as the "anti-crossfire rib" in pre war advertisements. Homer had replaced the wide bottom beavertail of the trap guns from that period with a long narrow forend to lighten the front end.
He developed a relationship with Beretta later in life and finished his career with a 3EELL gun with two sets of 28" barrels.
The guns featured straight stocks @ 1 7/16" x 1 7/16" with NO cast or offset and little or no down pitch. Barrell weight was kg. 1.460 or so for each set. One set choked @ .028 and .036 for American rings, and the second @ .018 and .032 for Europe.
Unique to the guns was a "ramped" or rounded step at the rear of the rib and slightly higher post than any ribs ever offered by Beretta at the time on their "Best" guns.
He was plagued with recoil problems with the gun, and turned to fellow East Alton Ill. resident , Jesse Edwards for the installation of 2 Edwards Recoil Reducers in the buttstock.
A common practice among some ATA All Americans of the period.
The result was a Very Butt heavy, short barreled gun.
His speed to the birds was still a stroke of lightening.
His shell of choice from my meeting him in 1976 until his last shoot shortly before his death was the Federal "Flyer load " of the period initially catalogued as the F124 8 and shown as a 3 1/4 dr 1 1/4oz 1220 fps non plated lead shot. He had nothing good to say about the only domestic competitor of the time , the Winchester Super Pigeon.....
