AmericanLongRifles Forums
General discussion => Antique Gun Collecting => Topic started by: Herb on July 07, 2016, 08:00:42 AM
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Again, thanks to Mtn Meek for telling me about this rifle. It is in the Nebraska History Museum. Senior Curator Laura Mooney allowed me to handle, measure and photograph this rifle, as well as the D.T. Hawken. The one shown here is the one Roubidoux drew a plan of some years ago. Laura is checking to see if they have a copy of that plan.
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/HerbNEHawk3_zpsxrjk1gxr.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/HerbNEHawk3_zpsxrjk1gxr.jpg.html)
Barrel is 32 1/8" to front of snail, where it is 1 1/8" wide. 1.090 at the muzzle.
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkenFull_zpsep95cktt.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkenFull_zpsep95cktt.jpg.html)
Length of pull is 13.5" to front trigger. Notice all the holes where there were brass tacks, on both sides of the stock.
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkRButt_zpsabeffsd6.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkRButt_zpsabeffsd6.jpg.html)
This is same buttplate as on the Bridger and Carson Hawkens, Track's #BP-Hawk-JB-I, which has to be filed back on the inside curve to thin it. Toeplate is Track's beavertail finial, #TP-TC-H-I.(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkButtP_zpstyqfldko.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkButtP_zpstyqfldko.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkLockFore_zpszxqhppo2.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkLockFore_zpszxqhppo2.jpg.html)
Trigger plate is 10" long and the trigger guard is 5.6" long.
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkTGuard_zpsjzu5ocoi.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkTGuard_zpsjzu5ocoi.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkLockArea_zps0udpiwrq.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkLockArea_zps0udpiwrq.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkLock_zpsn2tmytsi.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkLock_zpsn2tmytsi.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkTang_zpsk9nglhat.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkTang_zpsk9nglhat.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkStockTip_zpstgzdwe61.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkStockTip_zpstgzdwe61.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkenLeft_zpsi7dcapzf.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkenLeft_zpsi7dcapzf.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkCheek_zpsxursksdc.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkCheek_zpsxursksdc.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkCheek2_zps8cw4yp4b.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkCheek2_zps8cw4yp4b.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkLLockPanel_zpsbzgfroak.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkLLockPanel_zpsbzgfroak.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHHawkLeftFore_zpsovpxsav8.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHHawkLeftFore_zpsovpxsav8.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkLForestock_zpspdlkxkyr.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkLForestock_zpspdlkxkyr.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkName_zpsemzffst4.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkName_zpsemzffst4.jpg.html)
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkFSight_zps53015ugr.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkFSight_zps53015ugr.jpg.html)
.50 caliber. Rib held on with 3 rivets, front one missing, 1/8" hole. Rib not loose. One-inch long ball puller screw on inside end of ramrod, total length 32.5". Rod pipes .485" ID, .635" OD.
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/NEHawkMzl2_zps3vvo0sea.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/NEHawkMzl2_zps3vvo0sea.jpg.html)
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This is Senior Museum Curator Laura Mooney, who was so helpful. I gave her a copy of "The Magic Field", a true story I wrote about burning a native prairie in North Dakota, fire and prairie ecology. I gave the story to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for use in their "fire outreach" program.
(https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v122/HerbGLT/HerbLauraNE_zpsstnrmm7u.jpg) (https://smg.photobucket.com/user/HerbGLT/media/HerbLauraNE_zpsstnrmm7u.jpg.html)
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Thank You.
I enjoy the excellent pictures and measurements you are sharing.
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Thanks for all your doing,great seeing all these original hawken rifles
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Do we know any more about the history and/or previous owner of this rifle?
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What a great rifle Herb, and super images (have shamelessly copied and saved to my files for reference)!!
Thanks so much for these.
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There are at least 2 Hawken rifles at the Rock Island Arsenal Miseum that were turned in by Indians who surrendered to the army some years after Little Big Horn. They also had 5 firearms documented to that battle. Unfortunately the army is revamping the museum to be an interpretation display only and one Custer rifle will be displayed at a National Museum sometime in the future and everything else is being packed up for storage at a facility in Alabama. Included in this is a Rappahannic Forge wall gun in outstanding condition. I heard about the closing and visited it a month ago before it closed.
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Crawdad- I asked Laura about the provenance of this rifle, but I don't remember what she said, except it was not much. Her E-mail is laura.mooney@nebraska.gov. www.nebraskahistory.org.
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A great old rifle and wonderful pictures, thank you. How come the group of us that gets upset when a gun is reconverted to flint, doesn't say anything about the tacks being pulled when the stock was "restored". To me it is just as significant loss to the history of the gun. Of course the counter-argument could be made that the "restoration" which was probably done when the gun was donated to the museum years ago, would not happen today.
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I know nothing of its history. It looks as if it has been sanded so much that the edges have been worn off, and then some kind of finish applied. But the Cheyenne Hawken also has rounded lock panels. Were the tack holes filled with plugs?
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A great old rifle and wonderful pictures, thank you.
How come the group of us that gets upset when a gun is reconverted to flint, doesn't say anything about the tacks being pulled when the stock was "restored".
Sorry, but how do you know when the tacks were pulled out?
Or how do you know when the tacks were put in?
How do you know if the tacks were original old style tacks, or modern ones put there by a modern mountain man wanting to make an 'injun' gun?
How do you know who did whatever it was that was done to the stock?
As usual, your group knows nothing,,,,, but that small fact just doesn't seem to matter.....
Shame, it's a nice gun and why can't you just let it go at that, and enjoy the fact that someone took the time to go to the museum, take the pictures and measurements, and post them here?
John
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John wrote; "As usual, your group knows nothing,,,,, but that small fact just doesn't seem to matter....."
I guess we'll never know about the tacks John. Somebody took them out. Me, I like old injun guns. Don't appreciate being told I don't know anything though. Not sure how that helps the conversation. I did thank Herb for the photos. Great of him to share. I stand by my comments.
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Sorry to read the above post that the RockIsland museum is closing.I went to a class there in 1982 while working for D.L.A. in Chicago,and took a lot of pictures nd got to view some Weapons and other things stored in wall cabinets in the basement. I was hung up on 18th and 19th century US Military weapons at that time and therefore that's the pictures I have . nEW SUBJECT I HAVE A m-1861Springfield dtd 1861 Indian gun Barrel cut off with a file Stock burned out from cap flash.A beaded on felt like material tied to trigger guard(until the safe door hinge broke the skewer it was attached with(very brittle)It is retacked you can still see some of the original head outline .Don't know who did it as there is no refinishing.bought it at a filling station in S Dakota on Hwy 212(I think) in 1971 on the way to Malstrom AFB at Great falls Montana for my terminal assignment,I thought. O well just the rambling of a old man. George
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I said the rod pipes were .485" ID, but that was the ID of the entry pipe. The ID of the rod pipes was .515.
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Antoine Robidoux was a fur trapper in the southern Rockies to include Utah. I don't know if that rifle is part of his history but I'd be interested in knowing. He die in St Louis in about 1860 I think. Thanks for sharing Herb.
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Antoine Roubidoux had a trading post at Whiterocks, Utah, about 20 miles west of me probably in the 1840's. It was burned by the Utes and all the people there killed, except Roubidoux was not there. The Roubidoux who drew a plan of the Lincoln Hawken has the same name, I don't know if he is any relation to the trader. He lived in Lincoln, NE and probably drew that plan in the 1960's or 1970's. Curator Mooney is researching this plan and will let me know.
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Curator Mooney told me this Hawken came from an arms collector in Omaha in 1962 in the same condition as now, that is, the tack holes were filled. She is still searching for the Roubidoux drawing of this rifle.
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Back in 2013 a similar search for the Robidoux Hawken drawing was done on the ALR. Not sure of the final result but HABU listed a phone number for Kurt Robidoux. Might be worth a shot. I have a copy but I use them from time to time and really don't want to part with them. Good luck
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Back in 2013 a similar search for the Robidoux Hawken drawing was done on the ALR. Not sure of the final result but HABU listed a phone number for Kurt Robidoux. Might be worth a shot. I have a copy but I use them from time to time and really don't want to part with them. Good luck
And due that thread I contacted Kurt. He was a bit surprised that anyone was still interested in those drawings and said he would reproduce them but to my knowledge never has.
dave
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I bought a set of his drawings and have poured over them for years. I used them to create the patterns for some of my first Hawken builds, and they were very useful. The paper of my set is pretty tired. but the information is still valuable.
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I sure think I've seen this set of drawings for sale again in the last year or two - with a display ad in Muzzle Blasts or Muzzleloader. Might be able to search an index? Seems like the ad stated it was from the same family as the gentleman who drew them originally, and at the same price after 30 years! What a bargain.
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Crawdad- I asked Laura about the provenance of this rifle, but I don't remember what she said, except it was not much. Her E-mail is laura.mooney@nebraska.gov. www.nebraskahistory.org.
Thank you Herb for that information. But, like you said, there isn't much known about this rifle. A shame.
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Herb, thanks for sharing the pictures of this Hawken rifle.
Wayne Robidoux drew a set of blue prints of this rifle back in the early 1970’s. The set I have is dated October 18, 1971.
(https://i.ibb.co/VBD2Qk4/IMG-2430-crop.jpg)
IIRC, the drawings were the product of a class project when he was in college or a vo-tech school.
He ended up advertising the set of plans for sale in Muzzle Blasts and other BP magazines in the 1970’s and 1980’s. This one is from the January 1972 issue of Muzzle Blasts.
(https://i.ibb.co/Zd8z00s/72-01-MB-Wayne-Robidoux-ad.jpg)
As described in the ad, there were six sheets of 30” x 42” drawings in the set, plus three 8” x 10” photographs of the rifle. The course must have been a mechanical drawing or precision machining course because these are the most detailed and comprehensive set of blueprints I’ve seen for a muzzleloader. Wayne Robidoux provided drawings, dimensions, and details sufficient to make every part for the rifle with the possible exception of the barrel. Here are some of the details from his drawings.
(https://i.ibb.co/wyt3gdb/IMG-2429-crop.jpg)
(https://i.ibb.co/z5yWF27/IMG-2431-crop.jpg)
(https://i.ibb.co/jDc9jdB/IMG-2439-crop.jpg)
(https://i.ibb.co/dQPYNs3/IMG-2436-crop.jpg)
As sqrldog and PPatch mentioned, there was a lot of discussion on this forum a few years back about this rifle and Wayne Robidoux’s blueprints. As a result, Robidoux Inc. ran an ad in the April 2014 issue of Muzzle Blasts offering the blueprints for sale again. This is the ad you were thinking of Mr. Lienemann.
(https://i.ibb.co/Rb8dfzN/14-04-MB-Wayne-Robidoux-ad017.jpg)
There has been quite a bit of inflation between the early 1970’s and 2014, and the price for the blueprints had increased from $12 to $99.95. I purchased the set of prints I have in the early 2000's when Wayne Robidoux was still alive. As I recall, they cost just under $30 then.
Wayne’s blueprints were available at the beginning of the Hawken craze and advertised regularly in Muzzle Blasts. Yet, I find it interesting that none of the companies that made semi-production and production Hawken rifles appear to have utilized Wayne’s blueprints—not Green River Rifle Works, Sharon Rifle Barrel Co., Ithaca Gun Co., Ozark Mountain Arms, or A. Uberti & Co/Western Arms Corp. Had one of these companies consulted Wayne’s blueprints when they started up, they would have been way ahead of the curve.
It wasn’t until GRRW began the Bridger Hawken project with the Montana Historical Society in 1975 that they had access to an original Hawken rifle similar to the one that Robidoux studied and drew 4 years earlier. After 1976, GRRW began building and selling a mid-1850's Sam Hawken pattern rifle based on the Bridger Hawken as their standard pattern Hawken rifle, but it is also very similar to the rifle in the Nebraska History Museum under discussion.
One of the myths that circulates in the muzzleloader community is that the Santa Fe Hawken from Uberti/Western Arms Corp was built from a set of blueprints that had been drawn from the Kit Carson Hawken (sometimes it is the Ithaca Hawken that is a copy of the Carson Hawken). Leonard Allen of Western Arms Corp never made this claim. He apparently sent Uberti, as a prototype for the Santa Fe Hawken, a custom rifle built with Cherry Corners parts or one of the first Ithaca Hawken rifles that came off the assembly line. Had Leonard Allen sent Uberti a copy of Wayne Robidoux’s blueprints, the Santa Fe Hawken would have looked a lot more like the actual Carson Hawken.
It’s good to see some current photographs of the rifle to go along with the Wayne Robidoux blueprints, so thanks again, Herb.
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Now that is a drawing! I see I have misspelled his name. Thanks for the great post.
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WOW!
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Not a lot of difference in price when you consider the value of a dollar today compared to the value of a dollar in 1970. Worth the money if you want to copy an existing Hawken. Tim
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I hope nobody copies the muzzle which is minus any crown or chamfer.
A friend coped this gun in the 70's and did a fine job. He copied it again
for his father but used a shotgun butt like an English gun and it looked fine
and pleasant to shoot.
Bob Roller
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Yes that is a great set of drawings, I purchased a set back in the Hawken heyday and still have them. I refer to them everytime I go to build a Hawken rifle. I have two Hawkens to build in my backlog now and you can bet I will have these plans out while I am building these rifles.
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Are these plans available anywhere today? I'd definitely be interested.
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Are these plans available anywhere today? I'd definitely be interested.
This ad ran a couple years ago in Muzzle Blasts. Try calling the number at the bottom of the ad.
(https://i.ibb.co/Rb8dfzN/14-04-MB-Wayne-Robidoux-ad017.jpg)
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That's a good idea. I'll give them a try on monday.
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I hope nobody copies the muzzle which is minus any crown or chamfer.
A friend coped this gun in the 70's and did a fine job. He copied it again
for his father but used a shotgun butt like an English gun and it looked fine
and pleasant to shoot.
Bob Roller
Hey Bob, ???
I thought most if not all original Hawken rifle muzzles were done like this one.
I believe they coned them enough to remove the rifling at the muzzle and then filed fake rifling back in for looks.
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I hope nobody copies the muzzle which is minus any crown or chamfer.
A friend coped this gun in the 70's and did a fine job. He copied it again
for his father but used a shotgun butt like an English gun and it looked fine
and pleasant to shoot.
Bob Roller
Hey Bob, ???
I thought most if not all original Hawken rifle muzzles were done like this one.
I believe they coned them enough to remove the rifling at the muzzle and then filed fake rifling back in for looks.
From the lack of wear at the muzzle I would say that the gun in the photo has been used little if any.
Also the lack of pitting and wear on the breech says this is a little used rifle.The lack of a chamfer,bevel or a "cone"
would make this barrel harder to load with a proper size ball. MOST Hawken rifles do exhibit similar charcteristics but
few truly interchangeable parts.Today we have a lot of standardized parts due to production methods.
If ALL or most Hawken rifles had this kind of muzzle then it would have been brought to our attention long ago.
Filing in "fake" rifling was not part of the construction and this gun shows NO sign of it.
Bob Roller
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I think if the picture were a little better we would indeed find that what we're looking at is indeed that fake rifling.
This isn't a hill I want to die on . I just don't want folks to think that Hawken used the camfered muzzle or crown that modern shooters like.
If you look the Hawkens in the Jim Gordon collection you'll see that they're all done this way.
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I have looked at the muzzle of several original Hawken rifle barrels. I have only seen one with a crowned muzzle. That rifle had been re rifled and used by a modern shooter. I can't see taking great pains to copy the work of the old " Master" then counter boreing the muzzle. LP
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Don't know why Mtn Meek's photos are out of focus. Here is Robidoux's advertisement in Muzzle Blasts of March 1978.
(https://i.ibb.co/h1fC6NK/Robidoux-drawing-ad.jpg) (https://ibb.co/yBSV9C8)
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Herb,
I recently joined the Forum and this was my first opportunity to view the photos of the Hawken Rifle.
Thank-you very much for taking the time and making the effort. It is much appreciated.
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Wondering how that rifle made it to Nebraska. The Roubidoux's were big up in San Bernardino County in Southern California. There is a Roubidoux Blvd. and other places named for him. Not sure that he died there, but he certainly left his mark. Joseph Craig moved down there from Shasta County in NO. CA and died in San Bernardino.
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The rifle that Herb photographed has no connection to Wayne Robidoux, or any other Robidoux that I know of, other than Wayne drew up a detail set of blueprints to make a duplicate of the rifle.
That said, the family name of Robidoux, with its many spellings, can be found all across North America. They initially came to Acadia and New France. From there, they spread out through Canada, the Great Lakes region, St. Louis, Louisiana, and the West. The name has long been associated with the fur trade.
Joseph Robidoux II, a fur trader from Canada, was one of the early inhabitants of St. Louis in the 1770s. He raised six sons that were all involved in the fur trade. The eldest, Joseph III, ran his father's business in St. Louis. The other five sons went west. One of them, Antoine, went to Taos in the spring of 1824. Antoine trapped the southern Rockies with other trappers from Taos. He eventually established the first trading posts in Western Colorado. Fort Uncompahgre was constructed by Antoine Robidoux in 1828 at the confluence of the Gunnison River and the Uncompahgre River, near the present town of Delta, CO. In 1832, Antoine Robidoux built a second trading post up near where Herb lives that was called Fort Unitah. He built a third trading post around 1837 on the Green River in present day Utah called Fort Robidoux, but it was short lived.
From the Amazon description for the book Robidoux Chronicles: French-Indian Ethnoculture of the Trans-Mississippi West by Hugh M. Lewis
Robidoux Chronicles treats with comprehensive documentary detail the factual history of the Robidoux lineage in North America from the first progenitor who arrived in Quebec in about 1665, through the famous six brothers who distinguished themselves as Mountain Men, up until even recent times on reservations in the US. Many members of the Robidoux family were intimately connected to the entire history of the North American fur trade. The six brothers, born in St. Louis before the coming of Lewis & Clark, were important fur-traders during the classical Rendezvous era of the North American fur trade. They became key players in the organization & articulation of the Overland Trail, only to die soon afterward in relative obscurity upon the plains of Kansas & Nebraska. By the 1950's, the story of the Robidoux had been almost entirely forgotten. Subsequent historians had lost all but a scant & fragmentary knowledge of the true role & exploits of the Robidoux & their French-Indian compatriots upon the frontiers of the old west. Antoine Robidoux was the first to establish permanent trading settlements west of the Rockies in the Inter-Montane corridor, & his brother Michel was one of the first expeditions to traverse the length of the Grand Canyon. The eldest brother Joseph became one of the earliest established traders on the upper Missouri & founded St. Joseph, Missouri, which was later to be the primary starting point of the Overland Trail. His younger brother Louis became one of the earliest ranch owners in California, becoming Don of the Jurupa, that encompassed the areas known today as Riverside, San Bernardino, San Jacinto & San Timoteo. An entire inter-tribal French-Indian ethnocultural orientation had developed upon the plains, prairies & mountains of the Trans-Mississippi west a good fifty years before the coming of the Iron Horse & the Pony Express, & has been carried on today in proximity to the reservations of Kansas & Oklahoma, South Dakota & Wyoming.
I have no idea if Wayne Robidoux is a descendent from any of these fur trade Robidoux's that originated from St. Louis.
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When I looked up this thread this morning, Mtn Meek's photos were all out of focus with big "Photobucket" stamps on them. He phoned me on another matter and I mentioned the photos, which he corrected. Thus my post about them.
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From someone who has a LOT of experience dealing with technical drawings, that is a beautiful set of drawings. And it's a very nice way of turning something done in tech school into a money maker.
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Mick, to make the man a whole lot richer, let us know how to get copies of the plans. Many of us want to strive for period accuracy in our rifle builds, and this is a good way to accomplish that,
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Are Wayne Robidoux’s blueprints still for sale? Where? IF not, has the copyright expired? IF so a person who has a bluepeint set could make some cash by making copies at a blueprint place or even Kinkos aka (FEDEX).
I would pay up for good drawings, I'm sure others would too.
The only downside is that the dimensions are in fractions of an inch. To me that indicates they were done with a ruler. Yes, I know digital calipers were not used back then. Decimal measurements done with a modern digital caliper would be more accurate and easier to work from. I may have a chance to examine an original in a museum. If so I will make every effort to gather as much data as possible in the time I have with it.
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Digital calipers, you mean the really nice stainless steel ones, with the perfect 90 degree edges on them, that are razor sharp?
You won't find a pair of those ever touching one of my guns!
The plastic ones might be less prone to damaging the finish on the wood, but I'd think that fractions with a tape measure would be accurate enough for most guys.
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Well, I guess I come at it more as a machinist than a folk artist. There is no reason not to knock off the pointy ends if concerned. I have no recollection of damaging a gun with a caliper. I guess I am careful. Another big reason is making mistakes. In my professional life I made an error reading a ruler that cost me dearly. It is very easy to misread a ruler.
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I called 402-435-7203 from one of the adds above and got in touch with Curt Robidoux who is handling these prints now. They are available if you contact him. Was a nice guy to talk to. Hope this helps. Best
Zack