Frank Major Tobin was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, on January 24, 1862. As a young man he shipped out on a whaler, but the sea did not prove to be a lasting calling. He was drawn to the American west, and there he met and married his wife Anna, who was also born in Canada, in August 1868. Frank and Anna’s first child was born in Nebraska in March 1892. The next two children were born in Illinois. By 1897 Frank was in Norwich, Connecticut, working as a sales agent for W.H. Davenport Firearms Company. By 1901 he had a similar position with Hopkins & Allen Arms Company. Somehow when he was on the road for these Norwich companies he acquired the rights to Patent No. 498,043 for a breech Loading Firearm, granted May 23, 1893, to C.M. Wollam of San Francisco, California. The Tobin Arms Manufacturing Company of Norwich, Connecticut was incorporated in 1903 with F.M. Tobin as president, A.L. Potter as vice-president, and B.H. Palmer as secretary-treasurer. The company purchased a site formerly occupied by a grist mill, which was rebuilt and new buildings added, and commenced production of a hammerless double barrel shotgun based on Wollam’s patent. All the Tobin guns I’ve examined carry the stamp on the watertable “Pat’d May 23-93 and Patents Pending.” The gun was marketed as the Tobin Simplex Gun. The first guns were shipped in September 1904. The Tobin Simplex Gun was produced in a variety of grades from $30 to $200, and with options of either automatic ejectors or a single-selective trigger for $20, or both for $40. On the highest grade internal parts were gold plated and ejectors or the single-selective trigger were each $25 extra. The high price of the Tobin ejector is the reason I believe so few are seen today. At the same time ejectors were $5 extra on a Remington. The lower grade guns used Trojan Nitro Steel barrels, the middle grades Fluid Steel Krupp Essen barrels, and the highest grades offered the choice of Fluid Steel Krupp Essen or DeMoya Fluid Steel. Production of guns in 12- and 16-gauge continued in Norwich into 1909, and the generally accepted figure is that 11,089 hammerless doubles were produced in Norwich.
Tobin Arms Manufacturing Company, Limited, was incorporated on August 9, 1909, with its principle place of business stated as Woodstock, Ontario, Canada. Again the company produced a line of Tobin Simplex Guns in 12- and 16-gauge and a variety of grades from $25 to $250. In addition a hammer double using the same frame and bolting as the hammerless was added to the line at $20, and a simple .22 caliber single shot Boy Scout Rifle was added to the line of shotguns at $5. Advertising by Tobin Arms Manufacturing Company, Ltd. continued into 1916, but by then at least part of the factory had been taken over by the Arnold Thompson Tool Company. The generally accepted serial number range for hammerless doubles was 11,090 to 18,395. Tobin Arms Manufacturing Company, Ltd. is not listed in the Woodstock City Directories after 1916, and its charter was surrendered to the Provincial Secretary and Registrar on December 19, 1921. Frank Major Tobin lived the rest of his life in Woodstock. For many years he was secretary of the Canadian Stove Manufacturers Association. He was also involved in the marketing of a collapsible boat and early experiments with milk cartons. Frank died October 10, 1939.
A local gunsmith who had worked for the company, Gladstone Blake Crandall, bought the remains of Tobin Arms, and for many years billed himself as “Manufacturer of Tobin Guns (Successor to Tobin Arms Co.).” Crandall is believed to have assembled 551 Tobin Guns from parts, some as late as 1951. Crandall serial numbers reportedly range from 18,976 to 19,526. Some of these guns are quite good and others leave a lot to be desired. Some of the last were fitted with coil springs mounted on a cocking rod instead of the floating V-spring, the main feature of Wollam’s design. Crandall is more noted as a riflemaker and is mentioned several times in Charles Landis’ book Twenty-Two Calibre Varmint Rifles. After he retired, great quantities of Tobin parts were hauled to the dump and many a local lad collected enough to assemble a gun, but few ever did. I saw several sizable caches of unfinished Tobin parts when I visited with collectors in the Woodstock area in the fall of 1994. At that time the old factory building was still there at the corner of Drew and Winnett, and it was occupied by a shoe store.
