Can someone help me understand the museum Hawkens?

[greywuuf]

I have been trying to understand the range and breadth of Hawkin rifles in order to plan for which one I want to have built someday.     I have come across these photos ...and am confused https://centerofthewest.org/2014/05/05/points-west-hawken-rifle/   .......rifle one looks like a maple stocked TOW photo but otherwise has all the "definitive" hawkin hallmarks. Rifle 2 has an added ? Side plate ...and rifle three is a flint conversion with a HF brass trigger guard........and the one is this photo .....not even sure WHAT is up with this one.  https://centerofthewest.org/explore/firearms/collections/

[T*O*F]

The first thing to understand is that it is not Hawkin or Hawkins.
It's HAWKEN

[smylee grouch]

T.O.F. is right. There is also more to that Kenny Leonard/Bill Ruger/ Cody Museum story than what is told in that article.

[greywuuf]

Noted and understood.....a personal friends of mine and in my contacts in my phone is a Hawkins...as such my phone insists on "helping" me with the spelling.....I thought I was doing good to go back and get rid of the "s".....and yes I know there are a lot more extant examples ....being in Alaska making the trip to actually see them is a big more than a weekend car trip......I will get there ....someday. ....I just happened to be limiting my internet search to museum examples and these were presented .......and several of them seem to run counter to "conventional wisdom" as to what makes the Hawken unique (there I caught that one )

[greywuuf]

I also have to admit to only dismissively scanning the article as it seemed to be more about the museum and donations than the guns themselves .....and I was not interested in that nearly as much.

[rich pierce]

Go to donstith.com and talk to him, Herb, Taylor Sapergia, and Louie Parker, and search their posts on Hawken rifles.

[little joe]

The first thing to understand is that it is not Hawkin or Hawkins.
It's HAWKEN

It seems to me I have read where  the name was spelled different ways.

[Don Stith]

Lots of variation in the 30 plus years of rifles coming out of the Hawken shop. The !845 to 1855 period saw more standardization in the half stock design. Still lots of variation in the full stock model
  Some humorous info in the articles such as the under rib being added to reinforce the barrel and it being soldered in place.
  If you enlarge the photo of the one with the side plate; it is  a repair. Don't know what to make of the second lock bolt.  Lets just say that article is not the best source of info to base a build on

[smylee grouch]

I think your right about the name being spelled different ways Little Joe but I have seen many original Hawken guns and the name was stamped in steel on the top flat (Hawken) If you want to go back a couple of generations, Dr, Shumway I think , noted that Wolfgang Haga and Jake & Sam's  grandfather were brothers.  Hachen, according to Shumway or Kindig I think is the spelling for their name when Jacob and Sam's grandfather moved to America from Switzerland.

[greywuuf]

Oh believe me.....I have paid considerable note to Herb Don and Taylor. Have actually spoken to one of them on the phone .....it is FROM these men that I have come to expect walnut stock iron fitted workman like excellence and particular architecture. The specific examples I have noted are listed by museums as being genuine Hawken made articles and I was hoping someone could shed some light on what I was seeing. They are not obscure and I am sure many if not all have seen them....just hoping for ...I Dunno ..." Yeah that one is the only one we have seen that lock used" or "it is believed that one was modified repaired at some point" or th trigger guard evolved and went from oval to round late in the Gemmer era ........something.  AND ....THANK YOU Don Stith for the comment on the repair (and for the volumes of other info I have learned from you in the last 5 years)

[rich pierce]

I’m not in the know but those look like genuine Hawken rifles. I would not “expect” walnut stocks though some (many?) J&S Hawken rifles were stocked in walnut. I think walnut stocks were rarer on S. Hawken rifles.

[greywuuf]

Rich I believe you are correct and I am placing to much emphasis on the walnut ... Probably confusing myself with various makers and models I have been researching... I am still hoping for some more info on particularly the first gun in the first link and the gun in the second link .....ie: was that fist one refinished ? And the small patch box seems to be an anomaly ....and the gun in the second link ....completely round scroll on the guard ....weird lock plate ....single pipe ...really worn or weird underlug ...... (or just a bad picture)

[Clark Badgett]

Rich I believe you are correct and I am placing to much emphasis on the walnut ... Probably confusing myself with various makers and models I have been researching... I am still hoping for some more info on particularly the first gun in the first link and the gun in the second link .....ie: was that fist one refinished ? And the small patch box seems to be an anomaly ....and the gun in the second link ....completely round scroll on the guard ....weird lock plate ....single pipe ...really worn or weird underlug ...... (or just a bad picture)

From what I've gathered from my meager selection of books on the subject and from what Mr. Stith  and others have written here I can surmise the following.
1. The Hawken Brothers made custom rifles (like most makers in that era) and they became more standardized by the 1840s +/-.
2. There are at least a half dozen + different patchbox styles exhibited on extant models.
3. I've counted at least 4 very different types of lock, including recycled flintlocks converted to the Hawken bolster style, anything available was used.
4. Records show that .50-.54 were the normal bore sizes.
5. Fullstocks were cheaper than half stocks.
6. They also made shotguns and pistols. Would be nice if an original shotgun surfaced.

[Robby]

Now that I know how to spell Hawkins, I think a pistol will do! ArrrrrrI
Robby Louis Stevenson

[Herb]

That unusual sideplate is a repair.  There is another like it beside the trigger beneath the lock.  All three of these rifles are pictured in Jim Gordon's book "Great Gunmakers for the Early West, Volume III, Western U.S".  He has detailed photos of 31 Hawken plains rifles, five sporting rifles and four pistols.  You can get the three book set only from him, unless you find a used set.  $295 shipped.  Phone (505) 982-9667.  He has a museum in Glorieta, near Sante Fe.  About 30 original Hawken rifles, that many Lemans, too. 

[Goo]

Werent there other gunsmiths working in Saint Louis MO making 1/2 stock western plains rifles besides Hawken?

[rich pierce]

Werent there other gunsmiths working in Saint Louis MO making 1/2 stock western plains rifles besides Hawken?

Yes, but fame is priceless. 

[greywuuf]

Werent there other gunsmiths working in Saint Louis MO making 1/2 stock western plains rifles besides Hawken?

Yes, but fame is priceless.

At least 4 other makers are fairly well known ... ......one was and actual sucessor of the Hawken name ....the others were contemporary I believe ....but you will often find (and the spellings are all by guess and by golly) Lehman , Dimmek, Derringer and Gemmer.....also the auction sites I have seen several plains type rifle made by (supposedly) "known" makers in New York.

[Clark Badgett]

Werent there other gunsmiths working in Saint Louis MO making 1/2 stock western plains rifles besides Hawken?

There were many gunmakers, and there are other half stocks and fullstocks extant.  There was Dimick, Beauvais, Friede, Folsom, and at least a dozen more according to Hansen's The Plains Rifle (1960).

Besides the St. Louis makers, Tryon, Lehman and Derringer of PA were large scale makers that sold their rifles everywhere.

[Mike Brooks]

Nice pictures Herb. Them Hawken rifles must be as common as cookies......

[flinchrocket]

Greywuuf, concerning the Hawkens at the Cody museum, if you view them on their online collection you will find the pictures are mixed up on a couple of their rifles. I sent them an email about a month ago concerning this problem, but apparently they haven't straightened them out as of yet.

[greywuuf]

Thank you for that info.....I will been very careful with the captions. I am mostly at this point collecting photos....trying to familiarize myself with the "look" of the maker. Unfortunately the "more you know, the more you realize what you don't know".