Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters So...how bout Charles Askins, Jr.?

I bumped the thread, 1933 Superposed, to the top of the www.shotgunworld.com site, Browning Forum, so it will be easy to find. It's long, but interesting. Lots of input from very knowledgable gun folks. Also input from Bill Askins, the Colonel's son, with photos and info about him.

DF

Click on the www.shotgunworld.com URL, then select Forums, then in the drop down box, "I love my __". Scroll down to "Brownings" and hit "1933 Superposed."

It's now up to 29,304 hits with 497 posts.

DF

I added Thangle's very interesting piece to the "1933 Superposed" thread, which ended up more about the Askins than about the Major's pre-war Super. To see it in context, go to www.shotgunworld.com, Forums, I love my__, Browning shotguns, and 1933 Superposed.

Bill Askins has three daughters, Thangle refers to the Colonel as having four granddaughters. Thangle is either Bill's daughter or his neice. Hope to find out. I do like her writing style. Guess that apple didn't fall far...

DF

The link is a worthwhile read for anyone interested in the history of the older gunwriters, and of their guns.

I knew that Col. Askins was said to totally despise Jack O'C., but I never knew why. That is explained in the posts.

This is an interesting thread. Some have said that 60 years ago are not that different than today. Well in fact they are; in todays world BP officers are sent to prison for shooting a drug smuggler whom they believe is a danger and then the U.S. Goverment brings the scumbag over to testify against the officers.

Also, the smugglers are better armed and the National Guard sent to protect the border are not allowed to defend this country against them. Everytime there is a shooting by the BP the media questions it, but doesn;t seem to mind as much the killing of a rancher by a smuggler. Someone he was trying to help.

Read some of Bart Skelton stories along the border from 30 years ago and beyond and you will see things were done a little differently. (I know Bart was not there as he is too young, but he does know those who know.)

Askins and Hardin may be cut from the same cloth. Concerning Hardin the story goes Hardin killed a man while they were camped together because he wanted to get some sleep and didn't trust the other not to do the same to him. It should also be noted Hardin became a lawyer after getting out of prison and as I recall was murdered.

As far as justice, I remember reading an article in one of the Western magazines, I think "Wild West" of a fellow shooting another in the back while he sat on a board walk enjoying the day. The killer was aquitted because the dead man had threatened him a few days before. Times do change.

Laffin'

I read the first page of this thread and it was very interesting.

I clicked on the last page and saw this.






No matter how they start, we always seem to end them the same way.

Laffin'.

It is ironic isn't it.

I saw Col. Askins in New Orleans at the NRA convention in 1970. He wasn't a great big man, but has an air about him that was noticeable. He was headed from the hotel to the French Quarter, by himself, and I had the fleeting thought if he knew his way around down there. I then had the thought that he'd be perfectly OK, that anyone trying to mess with him would be dealt with accordingly. And that was before I read more about him, before I did some family history on the www.shotgunworld.com forum relative to his Dad's 1933 Superposed that I happened to end up owning. This info on the Fire about Charley is amazing, how many lives he touched, one way or another. Not many neutral feeling about the man. He wasn't that kind of a guy...

DF

JM,

I cross referenced this thread about Col. Charley Askins on www.shotgunworld.com, Browning forum, 1933 Superposed thread. There was a lot of interest on that post about the Askins family in reference to the Colonel's father, Major Charles Askins, Sr.'s pre-war Superposed Browning. I had to caution the shotgunworld crew about the occasional crude behavior encountered on this Forum. For some reason, we just don't see that over there. Maybe those shotgunners have more class than us riflemen...

Interesting contrast...

DF

DF-
I spent an interesting evening a year or so ago working through that SGW thread. It's a well-written mystery tale.

There may be a couple of reasons for the differing behaviors in the two forums. It's billed as "the Friendliest Shooting Forum on the Net!" Perhaps there is some attempt to live up to that motto.

The moderators there can be pretty heavy handed in enforcing civility and friendliness. A couple of my innocuous and I thought helpful posts have gotten blown away after some later posts later became impolite, and the entire thread disappeared.

--Bob

It's quite a tale, no doubt. It started off with me trading for this old shotgun, just because I like the lines and the way it looked. Traded a Jap Browning Sporting Clays gun, even swap. Only later found out that this old gun factory lettered to Capt Charles Askins, Ames, OK. The Browning Historian, Mr. Glen Jensen, called me at my office, all excited. I had left the serial number and model info on his answering machine. "Do you know who owned that gun?" he asked. Well, I guessed I was about to find out... On hearing "Capt. Charles Askins", I initially thought it was the Colonel, never dreaming it was his Dad, the Major. Well, the rest thay say is history. Since Nov. '77 there have been 500 posts and nearly 30,000 hits on that site. More hits than any post in the hitory of Shotgunworld since it's founding in '94 or there abouts.

Thanks, BTW, on the writing compliment. I'm not a writer, but have enjoyed the thread and where it's led. Met some super folks with great backgrounds of knowledge, as is the case on this Forum. Had nice exchanges with Bill Askins, the Colonel's son who lives in San Antonio. Bill was very helpful and we ended up with info not otherwise published or previously available about the Askins clan.

Glad you enjoyed it.

BTW, maybe a heavy handed Forum moderator is not all bad...

DF

Carlos Hathcock was born in 1942 and obviously did not serve in the South Pacific in WWII. He served in vietnam where he earned his honors and passed away in 1999, five years before you wrote this.

I think he meant that he was a Carlos Hathcock-TYPE person, not actually Carlos Hathcock. Surely EVERYONE knows Hathcock's story at this point.

One of us � you or I � needs to learn a bit about understanding what we read.

Did you notice, understand, or wonder why I put Carlos Hathcock between quotation marks?

That punctuation denotes that my late friend Wally was, in the south Pacific during World War Two, an earlier Marine Corps equivalent of the later and better known Hathcock.

(By the way, punctuation doesn't have anything to do with being at an appointed place at the appointed time.)

Reading is fundamental. Sadly, they don't teach it any more.

Why should anybody bother to write well � or at all � while fewer and fewer "readers" know how to read?

Many thanks to Ken Howell for his insights here, based on personal familiarity with the subject.

Not much I can contribute, except as a matter of possible interest to point readers at one of Stephen Hunter's fascinating novels about Earl Swagger, father of Bob Lee, the Nailer. Hunter steals a lot of historical info to stick in his books and in Pale Horse Coming, Earl acts out retribution on the bad guys by recruiting the most famous gunmen of the 1950s to help him out. Naturally though the names are changed, you can recognize Askins, Keith, O'Connor, Murphy, Bill Jordan and even Ed McGivern. What squabbling when they get together. Hunter has great fun with describing their personalities. And Charlie comes across pretty much exactly as he would have described himself, though maybe not to his family.

Stumbled across this 1961 article in Guns that Askins wrote about his father. It gives some insight into his obtuse persona.

"My Old Man and I lived a great deal
alone. He did the cooking, and I kept house.
He was a good shot but a rotten poor cook.
He never criticized anything. Neither did
he offer a lot of fatherly advice. I recollect
one time I pistol-whipped an old enemy and
the sheriff carted me off and heaved me into
the county pokey. My Old. Man rounded up
the necessary bondsmen and came over to
the county seat and bailed me out. On the
way back, the bondsmen would have taken
me apart. My Old Man cut them off at the
hip pockets with the remark, "Next time,
belt him with a longer barreled gun. You
can swing it harder." If my Old Man liked
you, he was for you, right or wrong."

Would love to see Dr. Phil deal with those two!!

Here's the link to the issue, the article starts on page 14:

http://www.gunsmagazine.com/1961issues/G0461.pdf

Reading his book explains it pretty well too.


Travis

I have read the book, but IIRC, Col. Askins only talks about O'Connor taking Maj. Askins job at Outdoor Life. I don't remember anything being mentioned about J. O'C. telling Outdoor Life that someone else was writing Maj. Askins articles.

This thread is the first time I have heard that.

I have also read that both Elmer Keith and Col. Askins helped out the Maj. when his health was failing.