doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com What did your grandfathers and father use?

Just curious as to what your grandpa and father used as a shotgun. My family all were raised in Ohio,as is Ohio State Univ., Look at your bracket sheet!! As a kid, late 50's, the first shotguns I shot were my Dads', Marlin hammerless model 28,12ga.and a Whippet 16ga. single shot. Grandpa SH. used a Marlin, Hammergun model 19, 12ga., and Grandpa Mc. used a Win. 97 12ga. They talked of hunting some pheasants, but mostly squirrel and rabbit. Grandfathers born in late 1800, Dad, in 1921. My first SXS[at age 16, was a 12ga. hammergun of unknown make that I bought from and old guy that worked for dad. I think I still have bone bruises on my index finger from that gun. As a youngster and trailing the adults with my 97 pump Daisy,I can remember racing and picking up the spent shells from the big guns,just to smell them. Also, do you remember the smell of a Fox squirrel. What do you remember as to the guns of your father and grandfathers? Were they given to you and do you still have them? Thanks for your comments.

Two 12ga. Parkers, a VH and a Trojan, which are still in the family but in rough shape. I could have them but they are not worth the familial suffering it would take to get them.

They both used Winchester Model 97 pump shotguns.

My Grandfather, had a Stevens Crackshot and a Baker Batavia Special?(steel barrels)
My other Grandfather, a Colt 41 LC
These guns are still in the family.
My Father was not a shooter, nor hunter.

For 40 years, Dad used the Model 12 12ga full choke he got from his dad, who had used it for 30 years before. It was used on everything from squirrels to birds to deer - while being loaned out back in the 30's, it even killed a bear.

During a moment of stupidity, I had it reblued and new stocks attached. I did it to honor them, but have had regrets since. I kept the old (beaten, scarred and cracked) stocks, and will put them back on some day. Some 4/0 steel wool will be used on the bluing. The gun rekindled more memories when it showed the signs of hard use.

As far as I know I'm the first hunter/shooter in my immediate family for 3 generations.

I know that my mothers uncle owned a Savage Fox B, it was the first gun I ever shot at age 9 and it knocked me on my ass. Don't know what happened to it.

Some cousins by marriage on the other side of the family, no direct relation to me, used to own a large sporting goods store in New Rochelle, NY, called Parker Bros. Distributors.

I went there once as a kid and remember seeing racks of used guns, this would be the late 60's, early 70's. Would kill to go back in time and ask to let behind the counter,

I came late to the sporting life, and I'm playing catch-up ball.

Rob

My father's father had a Win. 97, that my father used pre WW2. After the war, he bought a Browning A5 12 gauge and later on a Win 101, and a Model 12 Trap and came in to a Rem 1900 from somewhere, which he gave to me. I don't know what happened to the 97, but my uncle's got my Grandfather's Win model 70, some lever guns and a Colt 41 LC. My father still has his shotguns, with the exception of the Model 12 trap, which he gave to my brother.

My mom's father wasn't a shooter or hunter. He did own a Marlin 1881, a Savage lever 30-30, a Win pump 22-possibly a model
1890?, and short little 22 single shot all of which he got from his uncle. These were given to me (1881), my older brother(Savage), a cousin(pump 22) and the single shot 22 to my younger brother.

My folks have a few early photos of either my grandmother's uncles or brother's with a variety of game and birds and three or four firearms-a couple of which are hammer doubles. I've tried to figure out what the doubles are, but those early photos aren't real sharp, so no luck in IDing the guns to this point. It would be interesting to know what happened to those guns.

Fathers Father: Rem model 10 pump. A good gun for a lobsterman.
Mothers Father: A Mossberg 16ga bolt action with poly-choke.
A good enough gun for a Dairy farmer who didn't hunt.
Father: A Rem 58 Sportsman, replaced in early 80s by an Ithaca SkB 280-E 12 gauge, which he still hunts grouse with at age 76.
He still keeps his Dads' Model 10, which is now retired from a long life with Sea ducks, deer and Grouse in better numbers than now.

Both my grandfathers were long dead before I arrived. My father & paternal grandfather were both tarheels and my paternal grandfather hunted with a Parker that was lost to history somewhere along the way, so I cannot even venture a guess to its vintage nor grade. My father owned one shotgun, a model 97 Winchester that went back for a complete refurbishment in the early 50's. He hunted ducks with it, meaning that he took off from the office and hunted ducks until the season closed. He stopped hunting them when the limit was lowered from 25/day to 10. That is not saying that he killed 25 ducks per day for the whole season or ever killed 25 ducks in a day, rather it was more coincident to other changes in his life and ways, like the war & marriage and my brother & I. He also was a dove, quail and pheasant hunter and a fine shot. I have his gun today. It is a plain bbl'd 97 and has a Mod choke that throws full patterns. I don't shoot it much, but I do cherish custodianship of it.

My maternal grandmother was perhaps the real hunter on that side though both she & my grandfather hunted extensively when she was a spry young thing. She did a fair amount of big game hunting in foreign places, inclusive of the dark continent and bear in Alaska. The only surviving shotgun was a 12ga. Belgian SxS w/Damascus bbl's & Jones underlever that was sorta mostly still there, a wall hanger at best. I gave it to my brother some years ago and I hope but do not know for certain that one of his two boys has it now. All the rest of the guns, mostly rifles were stolen from an uncle many years ago. I remember seeing some of them, inclusive of a Remington pump w/the spiral tubular magazine and some old Winchester big bore levers. The only other gun to survive was a Winchester pump w/octogon bbl. chambered in .22 short, my grandmother's rabbit rifle. A cousin has it today and it shall remain quite safe & cared for in his hands.

The smells of spent paper cases and Hoppe's #9 are what I recall above all else of my father's shotgun adventures. That was, for me, dove shoots and I went from the time I was an infant so I was told, tho I can actually only remember it back to perhaps age 2 or 3. It is, in fact, almost my earliest memory .. going to a friends farm to shoot dove. I can remember him getting out of his '41 Ford Club coupe, taking his gun from the slip and putting his old jacket from Von Lenierge & Antoine (sp?) in Chicago [I also have that jacket] on and dumping a box of red cartridges in one of its' pockets and then sending mom & I on up to the farm house to see his friend's bride, and I can remember that like it was yesterday, even now. I can also remember some years later when I was allowed to actually shoot that '97 for the first and only time for many years. It was on the side of a tank dam [a 'tank' in Texas would be called a pond in most other parts of the world] and I was knocked back into a prickly pear cactus and got my tender backside, inclusive of a fair amount of posterior, embeded with thorns. I don't think he minded in the least that the extrication of thorns from my backside kept him from a limit that afternoon. He never mentioned that I missed the bird nor did he ask if I wished to try another shot. It was late in the day and the light was waning and I quickly determined on the way home that not all the thorns had been removed. Good times, those.

There was an ocassion when I was 12 and after I had my first 'official' gun of my own, a model 62A Winchester that I was busy hunting rabbits behind the dam of a conservation lake on a place that he had leased about an hour N. of town and I had the misfortune to move the tall dry grass back w/my bbl.trying to see 'what' was making it move and found myself facing a skunk's wrong end at very close range. It was a seriously humiliating ride home in my undershorts with my shirt & pants carefully wired to & riding on the rear bumper ledge of the '50 Chevy deluxe that was the farm & errand car. Wasn't a lot said on the way home, perhaps something about tomato juice. I figured that I was fortunate not to have to ride back there on the bumper with the pants. Still have the 62A, but it was the first and last time I was ever skunked in that manner. Dad & I had a lot of good time together. He never said a lot.

Paternal Grandfather an early PH-Grade Parker Bros. 12-gauge he got used in 1901. He died 1954 in his early 80s.

Maternal Grandfather a W.H. Davenport single. He died 1916 at age 51.

Father Remington Model 1894 AE-Grades in 12- and 16-gauge for uplands and a VH-Grade Parker Bros. 12-gauge for waterfowl. For the last 15 years he hunted (1972 to 1987) he used a 20-gauge Winchester 101 20-gauge I brought him from Japan a lot. Most of the time if he missed with the 101 he could be heard to say I'd have got that with my old Remington!!