My father was a side by side and O/U guy, but my Grandfather was an Ithaca 37 Pump Man. As a child all I heard was a matched pair of Purdeys was the ultimate. In our house there were only two shotguns then, a Browning Superposed which cost my father one months Captains pay in 1956 and a German 16 BLNE. The story on the 16 BLNE was my father took his Montgomery Wards 16 BLNE into an Amberg Germany gun shop to be reblued in 1957 or so. The store was robbed and the gun stolen. The gunsmith offered a gun in replacement and pointed at a rack of Spanish guns; none of which suited my father and across the shop he saw the gun he liked, the gun was a piece done by the gunsmiths apprentice who finished it as a gun to present to the Gunsmith Board as proof of his skill. The gun was according to the gunsmith way more than the value of the gun stolen, after some discussion between my father who did not yet speak German well and the gunsmith my father figured out the difference was 100 marks which was about $25, so my dad paid the difference.
Later the 16 BLNE became the first gun I ever took real game with Killing several deer in Virginia with No 4 Buck. Prior to using that gun I had my fathers childhood 410 single shot bolt action which I could not hit anything with. I still wonder what he was thinking taking me into a duck blind with a 410.
The double that lived in our family lore was a 12 ga LC Crown Grade my father brought at a Fort Sill pawnshop as a gift to my grandfather. My dad wanted my Grandfather to have a really nice gun. Apparently my grandfather never shot it well and stuck to his Ithaca. I suspect because the LC supposedly fit my dad and it was way too big for my grandfather who was a very small guy. They literally starved in the Old Country and grew out of his hunting clothes by the time I hit the 8th Grade and I was only 56 and wrestled 98 in High School.
The LC was something my Dad liked. When my grandfather was in the hospital dying of cancer my father flew out to California to see him. My grandfather could only talk about what he was leaving him (my dad was an only child). What my grandfather was land rich everything else poor. He owned some 80 acres in Santa Rosa of beautiful farm with vines and fruit trees and a house. My father responded the money the land was unimportant, the only thing my Grandfather had he wanted was the LC Crown grade, to which my dying grandfather responded that he sold it to one of the young guys at the duck club. My dad chewed him out on his death bed.
Over the years I picked up many Crown grades and none felt right to me and I passed. When I came across an LC Smith 20 5E and it felt marvelous I brought it for my Dad. When I tried to give it to him he chewed me out for spending the money and refused it. I shot it for a hunting season and never could hit anything consistently and when I got back from Afghanistan traded it for four guns and $7k to put central air in my steam heated house to get rid of the window units. My wife has been happy with the AC and I dont miss the LC. For me gun you don't shoot well is not worth having.
My fathers only other double of merit was an 1872 or so Damascus Rounded Back Action Hodgson Hammer Gun which I found for him at a gun show in Omaha when I was teaching ROTC at the University of Nebraska. He called me from Virginia and asked me to check on a Bar Action Sidelock he had seen online and when he called the guy he said he was taking to a show in Omaha that weekend, so I drove up to the gun show to check it out. The gun I was sent to look at was a dog, but next to it on the table was the Hodgson, well worn, off face, plenty of wall thickness. I picked it up and it felt like swing a sports car it was right. So I brought it. I emery clothed it to refinish, browned it and botched it, and it looked bad, so I striped and polished it again, mailed it to Keith Kearcher who put it on face, browned it beautifully; he even cleaned up the wood for free. My father loved it, shot it on preserve birds and clays.
When my father passed my oldest brother and I amicably divided the guns, he got the German 16 BLNE as I already had four 16s, he got my grandfathers Ithaca 37, and I got the Superposed and the Hodgson. Writing this makes me want to shoot the Hodgson this weekend on my last weekend of wild birds
If he knew I brought a Purdey 16 project gun with the money he left me after I paid off the house, he would probably kick me; then again he probably knows and probably will, but maybe out of jealousy. After all he inspired me from an early age.
A plain gun, but it feels perfect coming to the shoulder, and both my father and now I am deadly with it
