I may have misunderstood the OP, but it appears to me he bought the rifle because it reminded him of his Grandfather and his youth.
Everybody has reasons for buying guns and owning guns and not everybody's reason is to hunt with it or to kill something with it.
Maybe the guy doesn't want to hunt with the rifle, not because he is afraid of ruining it's value, but he just is at the point in his life that he doesn't want to kill anything? Which is A OK with me.
Sometimes we as hunters, we can take a narrow view of what guns are for...
