Of Time & Age - The Longrifle

[smshea]

So someone will have  to explain to this Doofiss why we have so many broken and repaired rifles not to mention period accounts of gun repair by gunsmiths .....someone was hard on them.
          Yes, I think UPS Delivery has a lot to do with this!

Amen to that brother!

[smshea]

As a side note...I don't do any reenacting, but I have repaired several guns for guys who do and allot of these guys baby their guns as best as possible.

[jwh1947]

Scotty, I'm with you.  I've been saying all along, there must have been a lot of plain guns that got all used up.  Mutilated.  Abandoned.  Just plain disappeared from planet earth.  Passed down from generation to generation and finally cannibalized for parts or just thrown out. 

Upon what do I base this gross premise?  Logical presupposition grounded upon an extensive data base and a lifetime of reading and handling old remnants and shards of Pennsylvania guns.  Could I be wrong?  Certainly.  But, I'd bet on it.  While I am wagering with ideas, I'd also bet that most were plain and most are not here anymore.  What do y'all think?  Wayne

[Majorjoel]

I would have to agree with the assumption that most were all used up and scrapped or recycled. When you look for man made artifacts that go back 200 plus years, there is not much of anything left today. Even houses and buildings. Only a very small percentage of dwellings remain. Remember the old slogan...Out with the old and in with the new! Heck, I don't even see too many old Ford Pinto's or Chevy Vega's running around town anymore. And that's only been a few decades ago.

[Mike R]

Scotty, I'm with you.  I've been saying all along, there must have been a lot of plain guns that got all used up.  Mutilated.  Abandoned.  Just plain disappeared from planet earth.  Passed down from generation to generation and finally cannibalized for parts or just thrown out.  

Upon what do I base this gross premise?  Logical presupposition grounded upon an extensive data base and a lifetime of reading and handling old remnants and shards of Pennsylvania guns.  Could I be wrong?  Certainly.  But, I'd bet on it.  While I am wagering with ideas, I'd also bet that most were plain and most are not here anymore.  What do y'all think?  Wayne

old lists indicate both  'plain rifles' and 'fine rifles' were sold, the fine ones on average costing about  1.5 to two times the plain.  I don't have stats compiled from these lists, but memory seems to indicate more plain than fine rifles sold. It has been my hypothesis [disputed by others] that the many fine guns we see pictured in the collectors books represent an unequal survival rate of fine guns due to their very nature as artwork and likely the property of the better-off sorts.  Today many gunbuilders prefer to duplicate these fine guns as artwork [or make rifles inspired by them]. I suspect the frontier dirt farmer/subsistence hunter and market hunters carried the plainer guns.  By the Golden Age  perhaps it became a fad to have a fancy rifle and those that could afford one probably came up with the cash, but folks like Dan Boone may never have owned a fine rifle.  He had 5 rifles stolen from him over the years by Indians and, along with his Quaker upbringing, likely went for plain utilitarian arms.

[Dr. Tim-Boone]

Well, According to Nathan........ Dan'l owned more than one at a time........at least in 1782........He went to the battle of Blue Licks with a fowler!!!   I have a plain gun I hunt with.......and a fancier gun I take to the range and show visitors...........

[northmn]

How plain is plain?  There is a rifle made by Beyer in the Library that is relatively plain and from the "Golden Age"  it has incised carving, inlays but no patchbox.  Personally I think there may have been more plainer guns made before the 1800's by noted gunsmiths than after.  The industrial revolution starting about that time led to abilities to take shortcuts in gun building such that certain individuals like Derringer or Henry were turning out plain functional rifles.  Another facter leading to the demise of plainer rifles was the fact that collectors ignored them.  More than a few were scavenged for parts.  Also time takes its toll and the pre 1800 guns got used up.  Many claim for instance that the NWTG's in my area were highly abused, yet a few stocks were found decorated with tacks and so forth that leads me to believe in their day they may have been prized and cared for.  They really were not an inexpensive item for the natives. The next generation inheriting a prized possession may have contempt for it and dispose of it.

DP