AmericanLongRifles Forums
General discussion => Black Powder Shooting => Topic started by: 83nubnEC on June 12, 2024, 11:04:20 PM
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Curious? How many shooters out there who started into muzzle loading from watching Daniel Boone and Jeremiah Johnson started out with a T/C Hawken? I have a feeling there would be very little interest now in flintlock/caplock muzzleloader shooting if it wasn't for the T/C Hawken. I heard they produced close to 3/4 million rifles before Smith and Wesson stopped production! Still have my 54 cal that I built from a kit in 1979 ;D
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Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett. My first bp gun was an 1858 Remington in 1969. In 1970 I bought a .45 caliber Kentucky rifle. I don't remember what brand it was, probably CVA. I never could get the thing to spark except once in awhile and it turned me off of flinters for many years. I didn't know what I was doing tho and didn't have anybody to teach me so most of it was probably my fault. After that I bought an Investarms Hawken.
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I started with tc cap lock 50 Hawken. That was 1974 within a year had a 36 longrifle flintlock never looked back.
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I bought my first bp rifle, a T/C .50 cal. "Hawken" flintlock, in 1972, when I was on a prisoner escort from Masset, QCI BC, to Vancouver, BC. I stayed with my Aunt and Uncle in Vancouver, and my Uncle provided me with 50 pounds of pure lad that I cast into round balls, placed in an old hard cased suitcase secured with a leather belt, and flew back up north with me. To this day, I cannot know how I got away with that incredibly heavy suitcase. But lots of things were different in those days. I mounted the aircraft in uniform with my sidearm, and my new rifle, and smoked a pipe on board. The good old days...
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In 1975 I received a CVA Kentucky for Christmas from my wife. She couldn't afford the finished model, so she was able to buy the $79 kit. I remember I did a fair job of the Birchwood Casey plum brown but forgot to clean off the steel wool whiskers on the stock and put a coat of Tru-oil on it. When it dried you could see little pieces of steel wool in the finish LOL. It looked like Mr. Magoo put it together. All I had was a pocketknife and a sharp screwdriver for a wood chisel and one of those 4-way rasps (which I still have).
Bob
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Just read Taylor's post and had to chuckle. Yes, THOSE were the days. Bought a .50 TC in '73 when I was in Smithers Detachment. Could have sworn Taylor bought his in 1971. Hed already shot some deer with it by the time I got mine.
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I don’t think I was influenced by any movies or TV shows. In 65 before I went to the army I worked in a friend's brand new little sporting goods shop while he worked at his regular job.
These three guys would come in now and then and they were into muzzle loaders. We talked a lot about it but off I went to basic.
Fast forward to 74 and I was a married home owner with two little girls and no spare time. That included time and convenient location to practice with my bow but it dawned on me that the new muzzle loader season would solve that.
My loving wife got me a TC Hawken for Christmas and it was on!
I never have gotten into the re enactment thing although the two organizations I belong to have many members who are.
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Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett had a lot to do with it for sure. But my dad was a WWII combat veteran and was very into the Civil War, so every summer we traveled to Civil War battlefields and that also served to get me interested.
Then one fall when my gun club put on a deer rifle match this fellow showed up dressed in a coonskin cap and wearing a brand new set of fringed buckskins we all gathered around to look at a longrifle flintlock he had built himself. Then he shot it several times and I was hooked. I had to have one. Then one day my cousin told me that penneys in Atlanta had some on sale for $100. A quick trip north and I had a brand new TC .54 Renegade. I hunted and shot this rifle in matches all over Georgia and did well. A few years later I bought a Lefthand Lyman Great Plains flintlock. Then I built a 54 LH flint lock rifle, and then a .40 flintlock. And then a few others for people who liked my rifles and wanted one for themselves.
I hunt with the .54 for deer 90% of the time, and the .40 is my turkey rifle 100% of the season. So I remain firmly in the fold.
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Not Davy Crockett or Daniel Boone, but James Fenimore Cooper (The Last of the Mohicans especially) for me. However when I was in 8th grade, our American History book had an illustration of one of S. Colt's revolvers and I was smitten. Not long afterwards, Revell offered a detailed plastic model of the 1851 Navy revolver, which you could cock and "fire," but I don't remember whether the cylinder rotated. Years later (1970), I acquired an actual Italian replica of that revolver and I was hooked. By the late '70's I bought a T/C Cherokee and I loved it (extremely accurate though light rifle). A few years later, I traded for a T/C Hawken .45cal. cap lock and the rest, as they say, is history.
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I got the bug by shooting a friends Hershel House rifle….. then asked Wayne Estes to make me one….i was influenced by reading early American history…. I never watched those tv programs.
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The extra week of deer hunting got me started with black powder. That said my first was a TC Hawken in 50 cal. I took several deer with it.
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History books with tales of Dan Morgan, the fur trapping and French and Indian wars etc. Wanted a T/C hawken in the worst way, never had the money or the time. I do now, living the dream with much more appropriate flintlocks and making up for lost time.
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Curious? How many shooters out there who started into muzzle loading from watching Daniel Boone and Jeremiah Johnson started out with a T/C Hawken? I have a feeling there would be very little interest now in flintlock/caplock muzzleloader shooting if it wasn't for the T/C Hawken. I heard they produced close to 3/4 million rifles before Smith and Wesson stopped production! Still have my 54 cal that I built from a kit in 1979 ;D
I paid no attention to the Boone and Crockett TV shows and the same for "Westerns"with the idiotic gunfights and EVERY one used the Colt SAA.When I got my first muzzle loader it was a 58 caliber Tower carbine with a 25 inch barrel.It is now in a collection here.This was in late 1951.In 1958 I built my first real serious muzzle loader and it had the first barrel Bill Large made when he got his shop operational and it was 58 caliber.It was also a match winner.Only ONE man shot a flintlock then and it had a Ketland lock.
I didn't know Smith&Wesson had any involvement with muzzle loaders of ANY kind :o.The flintlocks are now commonly seen and a variety of locks are now available that represent the very basic mechanism to the refined English types.I wonder if S&W will get involved with flintlock guns?
Bob Roller
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I grew up watching all those TV shows, but I never wanted a T/C rifle. To me they were butt ugly, with a short barrel, incorrect furniture, and a mushy coil spring lock. But the CVA mountain rifle really caught my eye. I bought a kit and built it, and then wore it out, repaired it, and wore it again. From then on it was home built guns, starting with a trade guns and moving on to rifles and pistols.
Hungry Horse
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My Dad did some restoration of muzzle loaders for a local small museum in Eastern KY in the early ‘50’s so I was introduced to them at the early age of thirteen. Shooting them was a lot of fun, hunting with them was a bonus. A little later I acquired a SxS Samuel Nock 14 gage percussion gun in excellent condition and that was one of my favorite bird guns. My hunting rifle was a flintlock 58 caliber that I built in the early ‘70’s when I lived in Denver. It was extremely accurate and enjoyable to shoot. Fishing became my serious pastime and occupied most of my time from the late ‘70’s until 2017. I moved to Eastern TN in 2017 and started shooting and building again. I don’t believe I’ll have that much time on the planet to do all the things I’d like to do in regards to rifle building. I’m really amazed how much things have changed mad3 possible by the internet, especially this site where people share their skills and knowledge unselfishly, it has allowed me to sort of “catch up” from my long hiatus from gun building, so a big Thank You to all.
Cheers Richard
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Curious? How many shooters out there who started into muzzle loading from watching Daniel Boone and Jeremiah Johnson started out with a T/C Hawken? I have a feeling there would be very little interest now in flintlock/caplock muzzleloader shooting if it wasn't for the T/C Hawken. I heard they produced close to 3/4 million rifles before Smith and Wesson stopped production! Still have my 54 cal that I built from a kit in 1979 ;D
Zane Gray’s “Spirit of The Border”, The Last Trail and Betty Zane read when In was 14-15? First rifle was a 32 cal half stock percussion with a Douglas bbl. About 1966.
Never owned a TC or a Italian spin off the only factory made was a 40 cal DGW “Squirrel Rifle” made in Begium.
I susoect that pyrodex killed many of the percussions at least. If not rebarreled.
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I.know of more than "several" that Pyrodex ruined.
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In 1970 my friends brother came back from Vietnam and found a Honaker rifle under an old house. It needed cleaned up and some parts and he found what he needed to get it to shoot he told us from a place called "Dixie Gun Works". It was a 30 caliber, and he let us shoot it a time or two. His caps were dear to him at the time, but he wasted a few on us punk 15-year-old kids. I was hooked after that got me a Dixie catalog and suffered for several years until I got that CVA.
Bob
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About 80 I bought an 1851 navy at a GEM store in Rockville Md. I belonged to a gun club and took it out there and shot two gunloads through it.
thought it too much trouble to load and cleaned it up and put it away. Christmas of 85 wife bought me a TC .54 cal kit. Winter of 87 or 88 I put the kit together and shot it a few times. I was shooting serious high power at the time and didn't have much time for other stuff. Finally retired in 91 and moved to So. Az. and most of my shooting was hunting for a number of years.About 2018 or 19 started shooting my long ago built kit gun and it took and I have been shooting BP guns ever since. Yuma has a good club but shoots mostly from about mid Sept. to about early April due to heat. We will start again pretty soon I think.
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I actually started with a kit just like yours, back in the 80s. It was a lot of work, but there's something special about building your own rifle. I think T/C’s impact on the sport can’t be overstated. They really sparked a lot of interest. I was in Burnsville a few years ago at a local gun store near Coon Rapids MN conceal carry (https://themodernsportsman.com/coon-rapids-conceal-carry/) training, and the owner had a collection of old muzzleloaders. He told me he used to hunt with a T/C Hawken, and we got into a great conversation about how much the gun community has changed.
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Easily influenced I am. Watched Jeramiah Johnson, wanted a Hawken, got a TC Hawken in .50 that I still have.
Watched Indiana Jones, had to get me a long bull whip.
Watched Top Gun, couldn't afford an F-16.
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Bought an M16 instead?
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My maternal grandfather with his stories of using a muzzleloader in the old country (shotgun of course) during his hunting adventures was the first "bug" bite. We were very close and I loved him dearly. First rifle cost me $75, oh how hard to come up with that, from a man advertising in Muzzle Blasts called Red Boggs. It was a .32 Ohio halfstock and the squirrels in East Tennessee suffered. First shotgun was a 32 bore double barrel from Dixie Gun Works. Powder and caps had to come to East TN as railroad freight via the Gulf, Mobile and Ohio RR from Union City, TN. Sadly, I don't either of those today, but the memories are as bright as ever. That was a lot of years ago as a mere boy! Danged, I am old!
J.B.
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When we were kids, I was maybe 10 years old, we shot a 16 bore cap-lock Ontario (likely) shotgun - using just powder, some kind of wad and a marble.
The game warden who was a friend of our Dad, had a boy named Jim who was interested in muzzleloaders. This was pre - or around1960. The stock of
the gun we shot, was cracked and Jim repaired it with toothpicks and wood glue. LOL - THOSE were the days.
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I think Last of the Mohikans series on telly got me going, but guns had always fascinated me.
first gun of the type not home made in the shed, was a Perdersoli flint longrifle.
Bit disappointed when it arrived as it seemed like a toy.
smooth bore because of English gun laws.
Flint was always iffy so I made another lock plate and converted it to detonator.
When we came to Canada in '84 I soon bought a used .54 Lyman Great Plains. 1 in 48 but shot Very well with a good patch and heavy charge.
Ugly humped back thing so I altered the humped back profile a bit. Had it a good while and shot lots of meat with it.
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I became infatuated with long guns before Walt Disney came out with the Boon & Crockett series on TV. I always wanted one but never got one of my own till after I came home from the service. A 50 cal Num rich Arms percussion. Great barrels poor lock. Shot several deer with it and then started making my own from blanks. $100 would buy a Douglas barrel, Siler lock , all the brass and a great full stock sugar maple from Homer Dangler. Boy those were the days my friends. ;)
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I became infatuated with long guns before Walt Disney came out with the Boon & Cricket series on TV. I always wanted one but never got one of my own till after I came home from the service. A 50 cal Num rich Arms percussion. Great barrels poor lock. Shot several deer with it and then started making my own from blanks. $100 would buy a Douglas barrel, Super lock , all the brass and a great full stock sugar maple from Homer Dangler. Boy those were the days my friends. ;)
Thank you for your service!
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Fess Parker stirred my interest. In the 70's, a TC Hawken got me going. After a trip to Dixon's in 2000, it was goodbye Hawken, and hello Longrifle.
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Free meat.... I was a father at 18 and had mouths to feed. Since the county I lived in disallowed modern rifles for deer hunting I chose to go with a .50 caliber percussion Black powder rifle which was way more accurate than the old pumpkin balls out of a shotgun.....Then I realized that with a bow I could hunt 90 days a year and my guns began to collect dust.....My interest in flintlocks was born out of making and hunting with wood longbows which I consider to be the premier way to hunt whitetails. Flintlocks are cool though and offer quite the challenge when hunted from the ground at bow hunting distances......They are to hunting what the bamboo fly rod is to fishing!
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I can well recognize that comparison to a bamboo fly rod.
Every summer at the lake, my first rainbow is caught on my late father-in-law's Heddon bamboo rod.
Then it goes back into the sock, then into the plastic tube he built for it's storage. The rod is like new,
except for a crack in the reel seat which is held quite securely with the threaded ringed reel holder. I
surely enjoy casting with it, such a slow sweeping casting stroke.
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I can well recognize that comparison to a bamboo fly rod.
Every summer at the lake, my first rainbow is caught on my late father-in-law's Heddon bamboo rod.
Then it goes back into the sock, then into the plastic tube he built for it's storage. The rod is like new,
except for a crack in the reel seat which is held quite securely with the threaded ringed reel holder. I
surely enjoy casting with it, such a slow sweeping casting stroke.
I have an old Heddon from the 1930's that I will restore this coming year, Lord Willing.....I agree that there is something about the soft touch of these rods. For trout they are awesome....For crappie, sunfish and such I use old glass rods. The Phillipson glass rods of the 1950's have that "bamboo" feel yet are bombproof and able to withstand the "boat rash" from being fished from my boat and my canoe ;D......Old Fenwicks are the "bees knees"...... ;D
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I worked as a volunteer at the Vicksburg National Military Park at age 13. Fell in love with Black Powder. That Christmas my parents gave me a Tc Hawkin kit that my dad and I built. Also bought a kentucky pistol from a guy for $25. We spent a lot of time learning the ins and outs of BP together with those 2. Then as I got older I started building.
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My mom’s friend had a TC hawken she wanted to sell, so my mom brought me over to the lady’s place to look at it and we bought it for $100. I was 12 or 13 maybe. Been shooting black powder ever since. My mom also bought me an original Springfield 1816 musket, I can’t recall where she got it, but I bet she got it cheap.I don’t think we owned a gun that we paid over $150 for till the late 1990’s, lol. Kiblers kits are introducing folks into flintlocks in a very profound way, I personally know guys who would not have tried the sport if Kiblers kits weren’t available. Lately I’ve been watching Daniel Boone at night before I go to bed, great show.