Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Custom Rifles History in America?

Just curious mostly, is there any one place to look through and find examples of custom rifles, made in USA, or at least customized in USA?
What I would love to find is examples of custom rifles through the years, say starting in the early 1900's through about the 1970's. What were the common stock woods and styles, what actions were being used, and who were the rifle builders? I would love to be able to identify a time frame of the build from looking at the styles.

just wondering if there is a coffee-table book with all this information somewhere?

Gun Digest used to do a chapter of custom guns , but they stopped a long time ago. Probably in the mid 90's

You might try finding a copy of these two book: both B&W print. More a How to than a picture book.

Gunsmithing by Roy Dunlap
The Modern Gunsmith Vol 1 & 2 by Howe


Also maybe find some old Griffin & Howe catalogs.

Here's a pic of what Gun Digest used to have, not very detailed. (1973)

I don't know of one single book, but you could build a solid reference library without much trouble.

"American Hunting Rifles" by Craig Boddington explains the evolution of American hunting rifles from black powder to where we are today. It doesn't have many pictures of historic examples but he explains the evolution from a shooter's perspective and he's a superb writer so it's clear and easy to understand.

Townsend Whelen had a number of custom rifles built throughout his life, which he describes in "Mr. Rifleman." Same with "Hell, I Was There" by Elmer Keith and most of Jack O'Connor's books. These books all describe the specific features of the rifles, why the writers wanted them, and the men who built them. Other writers wrote similar books but those will get you started and they're not hard to find.

Over the years, Shooter's Digest and similar publications documented the evolution of sights, scopes, mounts, recoil pads, and other accessories that were commercially available, which affected what customer builders used. You can find these in gun shops and second-hand bookstores for a few dollars each.

Online sale sites have custom rifles by top makers, and you can learn to spot the work of specific makers pretty quickly. My favorites are

http://www.hallowellco.com/magazine.htm
http://www.champlinarms.com/
https://griffinhowe.com/
https://stevebarnettfineguns.com/rifles

The thing I always look for is selection of full-length, undistorted pictures of the rifle in question. That's the only way you can really see the features in relation to one another and learn to identify custom rifle makers.

It's a fascinating area of study.


Okie John

Michael Petrov book(s)

A very good place to start, IMO. He chronicled the history of custom rifles in the pre-war period, from circa 1910 to 1940. Niedner, Owens, Howe, Griffin, Dubiel, Oberlies, Griffin&Howe, etc. are all covered in detail. Lots of inspiration to be had. To my knowledge the two books haven't been reprinted since his death so extant copies are getting harder to find and are increasing in price, so move on them now if the intent is to acquire them.

Petrov's books are a master's level course in pre-WWII U.S. custom gunmaking. They are worth every penny.

Your interest is entirely fair, but your prospective variety about as wide as to be conjured. If you could narrow a bit. First, I'm 'assuming bolt high power rifles'. If wider, please expound. Then frankly the metal far less led by aesthetics than functionality. The stocks were the strong aesthetics element. Their "classic style" to "modern" evoution, far more reactionary as driven by ergonomics. Ergonomics in turn driven by more modern rifles featuring heavier weight and recoil.

SHORT ANSWER: Check out generic Remington Model 30 and Winchester Model 54 rifles in earlier and later styles each similarily reflecting basic evolution of "genre" stocks of the Nineteen Twenties & Thrities as there 'core patterns' extending to today, excepting "Wild"! Stocks of non-standard hunting application as more "tactical" and stock materials as affecting/affected.

LONG ANSWER: Kindly fasten seat belts and "No Doze" tablets recommended!

Mainstream American and European bolt actions predominantly followed the Mauser pattern or to emulate in extent of stock styling as what folks were 'used to'. Earlier bolt action stocks in centerfire chambering rifles were driven by European commercial stock style. Narrow schnabel foreends, pistol grip, straight comb stocks with considerable drop at heel. That is, from boreline projected aft, the top of the stock but below that line as being considerable. Those stocks prevalent both in the Remington Model 30 and the Wincheser Model 54, intro'd in 1921 and 1925 respectively. In Europe the sporting mauser pattern similar pattern but also with full stock configurations with aft end about the same. English gunmaners were often making heaver chamered rifles for the monied African hunting trade. They required more stout stocks and eventually also more ergonomic stocks lest their bodies battered by repeated heavy recoil.
By the thirties, a small stock revolution as certain prominent NRA members, led by Col. Towensend Whelen, Retd, advocated successfully for both Winchester and Remington to modify their European style stocks complete with schnabels to bit heaver stocks. Principal reconfigurations as Heel raised to more proximate to boreline and fuller, more hand filling forends. Gone the schnabel. I still like the older style for aesthetics, not for ergonomics! Postwar, the rise of the telescopic sights required further accommodations yet more as 'compromised' since scopes not so prevalent at first. The early fifties saw the development of the so-called "Monte Carlo" stock design featuring an integral elevated cheekpiece. The head comfortably positiioned higher to coincide with scope tube to eye coordination. From there, such as Roy Weatherby began to design more aesthetically extreme stocks for marketing to match his then more 'extreme' chambrings. That a trend which co-existed with the more modest postwar iterations with heritage of those NRA style rifles. Since then, more custom stocks available and moving more toward dimensions of the imagination as constrained with rifle recoil not damaging the stock and human body proximate. 'Most' stocks of varying wood and "pretty" stocks springing up too. With the synthetics more freedom to scale down and lighten stocks and moving toward wider aesthetics, ergonomics, and material strength horizons.

Bolt actions evolutions more constrained. Not in terms of absolute designs, some relatively radical such as aft locking bolt systems versus more conventional action forward locking. Engineering designs! Multi-lugged bolts with lesser bolt rotation, triggers as more precise as also retained safety factors, metals such as alloy introduced such as bottom metal. Considerable cost savings, some weight savings as also the unsung greater propensity for scratches adverse to aesthetics. The mosr noticable elementary changes in bolts from the very nineteen twneties, "low scope bolt handle configurations".
Remington with their Model 1917 mililtary holdover, coincidentally as "low bolt". Winchester redesigning the Model 70 to accommodate a "low bolt" handle design. But in "accommodation"
designs.

Bolt rifle "custom designs" a combination of aesthetics, 'make 'em fit, individual frames/tastes and just details. Large "production type" custom rifle potential firms with catalogs. Stock material in wood, basic styles inclusive of half or full stock. Details as checkering and carving as desired. Much of that 'stuff' evolutaionary as 'more mature monied buyers of custom rather than the 'whippersnappers' of their twenties or thrities. Still, room for all tastes. Most of which accommodated by cost concerns balanced with what most factory production rifles to cover. "Scopes", becoming the new wild card. Much as buying any accessory stuff today where the 'accessory' may exceed the cost of the underlying asset such as the rifle itself. There was also some traditionalism too in rifles partiuclarly of the fifties. Mannlicher Schönauer Austrian rifle most traditional context of "full stock" models. So their 'wrap' until the mid fifties when they went wild with their Model 1956. Look up the model and check out the exaggerated cheekpiece!

Barrels were perhaps the most 'ho hum' in American rifles. The prewar era where sometimes a "carbine bolt choice, but pretty even those "off the shelf" inclusive of varying weights and minor 'target' model configurations including stocks. This was never a large market. Gunsmiths to make any aftermarket alterations to be agreed. Europe... The European bolt rifle makers, more liberal with styling and 'normal' off the shelf sporting barrel styles from round to half octagon to full octagon. Them also with more accessories as well as with special 'stuff' included by submodel. Quality steel trapdoor butt plates on such as their fullstock models "standard". Big military arms factories often provided sorting rifle manufactoring divisions. Until after WWII, large sporting production offered hand accomplished custom/specialty rifles. Postwar, as Europe finally reemerged from war deprivations and resumed productoin, far less 'customization' existing. What large factories such ad Belgium's Fabrique Nationale (aka FN) did was to sell both their own complete sporting rifles and such as actions or barreled action components. The were moderately successful for through most of the fifties decade. So the FN commercial mauser action action to be purchased and like a Christmas tree, 'adorned' with barrel, stock , etc by either firms that built under their own name in qualitty for sales, or by custom gunsmiths building in semi-production fashion. Paul Jäger or Hunter's Lodge, both of Pennsylvania specialized in such FN action builds or simply to sell the actons themselves at retail!

What more to say? Maybe that this isn't a "timed test". Pinging on Gun Digest, they printed a "Treasury", one or more, which may be helpful. Probably just to google! Needing to experiment some with search terms lest garbage in garbage out... Such as you've just encountered in my herewith Post!

Hope this helps! Right of top of my head and unedited! Whew!
Best!
John

Thank you sir for that most enlightening response! That was almost exactly the information I was looking to find. I am always interested in the 'why' things change, a better design of the model 70 vs the model 54 for example. In stocks specifically I have been wondering why the Monte Carlo or the rollover stock came into being. Your mention of Roy Weatherby matching his stock styling to his chambering 'styling' explains much.

I have wondered why the straight comb stock with a shadow line cheek piece, coupled with a 90* ebony fore end tip is (at least to me) considered 'classic'. Classic of what? I suppose classic to me because it was a product of 'the olden days' before my time of which I had seen and read about in dad's old hunting magazines.


Again, thank you for your thoughts.

Rifle stocks have been evolving ever since the matchlock and the current fad for chassis stocks is the latest.

And does anyone know what Michael Petrov's books are now selling for ?
I think I have one set left from all I purchased from Michael's estate.

Yep!

And yes I have been following the prices on Mike's books!

To buy or sell?

$250 for both books, still unopened and in the wrapping from Michael's estate

That's a steal!!

Wonder why nobody does another printing?

In addition to what's already been mentioned, I'd recommend Kennedy's Checkering and Carving of Gunstocks; the Gun Digest Review of Custom Guns, edited by Ken Warner; Modern Custom Guns by Tom Turpin.

Hmm.. weren’t most if not all black powder rifles “custom” made by black smiths when the colonies first started and stay that way for a long, long time.


things date back a ways..

Hi iskra, here is an example of one, the I own that my father sporterized, after it was given to him by his good friend and hunting mentor.

Originally it was a P1917. Birmingham Small Arms Company aka BSA bought up a lot of surplus 1917s' back in the late 40's and sporterized them, to sell them as hunting rifles.

Took me a long time to find out exactly what it was, because the marking on the barrel always threw me off.

Mine is a BSA Sporterized P17 that was sporterized by BSA between 1949 and 1953. My father sporterized it further by replacing the stock with a hand carved Ferlach Austrian designed stock with a Schnobble fore-end and the wood is French Walnut. The stockmaker was Klaus Hiptmayer and engraved by Heidi Hiptmayer.

This .30-06 is without a doubt my favorite hunting rifle of All-Time, deadly accurate and lethal!

Cheers ~

That's a good question, but since Michael had them printed and owned them all I would guess there would be some legal issues.
They were a work of love

Mr. Petrov's books are probably the closest to what you are looking for. Jim Carmichel's "Book of the Rifle" has many builders rifles represented, but not exactly just a book on Custom Riflemakers. I'm sure the ACGG has a publication or two that might help.

I'll add one more book. Custom Built Rifles, their design and Production. by Dick Simmons 1955