The running deer is one of those enigma pieces that will probably be argued over until another shows up with a signature or something more regionally oriented. There are two pretty firm camps, one based in VA and one in Berks Co. Personally, I'm fairly non-committal because I have no idea whatsoever where it was made. It's pretty unique without any really obvious co conspirators.
Someone sent me a pm and asked about this current 'fake' and a comparison or not to the well worn "bird head" rifle in RCA II. You know, the step wrist gun with the somewhat ugly bird head-ish brass box slapped on the side (later) and brass repairs under the very deformed guard. Now that, to my mind, is an earlier ca. 1780s upper townships rifle, probably Kutztown or north and east toward the blue mountain. I sense somewhat of a forerunner of the later pieces by Jacob George and Stoffel Long in that rifle, and for all I know it may be an unsigned Henry George (Jacob's father) who was a gunsmith and likely trained a number of those upper Berks townships guys. Unfortunately there as yet has not materialized a signed Henry George.
This is largely modeled after a few unsigned rifles that I think are probably Stoffel Long, although I have to throw Jacob George out there as the two obviously had some kind of connection. Mike D'Ambra has had some cool "stoffels" over the years despite no signature, and this is largely modeled after a couple of those as well as some of the published stuff.
One way I look at aging these is that while initially you can age up the parts individually, i.e. I use a pvc 'sweat pipe' to get the barrel going, and I may preliminarily fume the brass in ammonia (nothing looks better but be careful!) in a closed container, ultimately these rifles have been refinished probably 20 times and at some point the whole piece has to be put together and THEN you have to continue on with the aging, rubbing back, refinish, age some more etc etc etc all as a complete unit. At some point, taking them apart repeatedly becomes a detriment. So one thing that is mandatory is a large enough somewhat impermeable container or tent to fit the entire rifle. After all, a rifle that may have dried out and aged in an attic, or barn, or basement, or closet for 100 years, was doing so as a completed object and not a pile of separate parts.
I really, REALLY appreciate all of the commentary guys. Thank you very much.
