Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors Who carved the Monarchs?

Do We have a name for the stock-maker who created the Monarchs? Was it a Savage employee, or a commissioned artisan? What year(s) were those created? How many exist?

I have no tru knowledge on it but I remember a fella by the name of king did some stock work someone will chime in with better info

I’ve also read that Wm. King did the stock checkering and carving on the early high grade Savage 1899’s.
Whether or not this includes the Monarch rifles?

It's covered in David's new engraving book with examples.

William Irving King 1871-1950 was born in Brooklyn, New York the son of Irish immigrant parents. It is known that W.I. King was a carpenter by trade and a skilled wood carver. He married Augusta Rogers also of Brooklyn and they relocated to Sauquoit, NY ~1900 where W.I. King was a carpenter. In 1904 a son Sidney was born. In the winter months when working outside was cold and harsh, Augusta and Sidney returned to Brooklyn to live with her family while King worked for Savage Arms in Utica undoubtedly in the rifle stock department as a wood carver and possibly other jobs. It is also known that King carved rifles for Winchester about the time of the 1904 World Fair in St. Louis so evidently operated as a contractor as well. Records indicate that the W.I. King family moved to Eugene, Oregon when Sidney was ~6 years old a short time after 1910. It is not clear if King remained in the carpentry business, however, he is known to have continued his love of wood carving and King descendants retain a number of wooden figurines carved by King.
It is not clear exactly the quantity of King carved Savage rifles though the number is likely small as King’s time with Savage was not long and carved stocks were a high priced extra. King carved rifles are highly desired by collectors today.

The Dodge rifles, P.J. Noel and others.

Some of the figurines carved by King while in Oregon post Savage.

Thanks Rick!

What's the date range of the Monarchs? I thought that they were after 1910 (, so after W.I. King left the building,
..in Utica at least)

According to Rory's book, Monarchs date ~1904 - 1915.

So definitely some W.I. King overlap ~1899 - 1910.

Other scenarios:
- there were other stock carvers we are unaware of.
- King carved stocks in advance of rifles and were fitted and assembled later on the ultra deluxe rifles.

That get us in the area, but still some unknowns remain.

The Dodge guns are years after 1910.. so that's an interesting question. Did King do the Dodge guns if he'd moved to Oregon?

There were very few carved stocks done. I wouldn't think they'd ship them back and forth from Oregon, if somebody else in the northeast could be found to do them.

PS: And it's likely Savage would have made a Monarch after 1915 if somebody had wanted to spend the money. It just wasn't catalogued after 1915. None of the special grades really were, though we see scattered references to special grades in the 1920's.

I have record of King in Eugene, OR in 1910.
Working remote is possible.
There were numbers of different checkers over the years.
Maybe there were more carvers than we are aware.

Certain that there are experts who can examine known Savage carved stocks and determine if they are the work of a single individual.

I don't know.. are there?

"William Irving King 1871-1950"

A man who is 35 might evolve/change his carving style by the time he's 45. The carved stocks vary in pattern a LOT, the people doing them were artists and many are unique examples.

Absolutely, consider that people change their handwriting throughout life, but the underlying characteristics remain the same and can be identified by graphologists. Same holds true for firearms engraving. Piece of cake for an expert with a sample of maybe 12 carved stocks.

This possibility seems more likely than cross-continent shipping for craftsmanship talent in the 19-teens. Are there any (date) entries for the Dodge rifles in the manufacturing logs?

It gives us another name to look for in the employee records!

I can certainly believe other carvers may have been in the loop over time. Particularly due to the dates that surround King's time. Proof is the challenge.

I have traded messages numbers of times with Roger Bleile.
Roger Bleile is the foremost American Engraver of our time, Historian, author, associate of R.L. Wilson and is the founder of FEGA (firearms engraving guild of America).
His comments were basically unless an engraver's work is signed or initialed that it is virtually impossible to verify a particular engraver. And most were not signed or initialed.

Savage had carved stocks before the Monarchs were built.

I have heard of 15 carved 1899's an photos of two more that have

not come to the light of day as far as I can tell

King seems to have left New York in 1910 for Oregon.
Do you think there were other carvers for Savage? Thoughts?

I know that there were other carvers i do not know who they were

I have a 1910 Winchester carved that was done much later in

September 1927 the work is a different style carving but

very well done.

If you look at the high resolution picture of the Savage display at the 1904 World's Fair that kdog posted about the detail is good enough to see a number of high grade rifles and there looks to be examples of carved stocks, that fair was in late 1904. If you click on the image it can be blown up to see some details, if someone has good image editing software they might be able to bring out a lot more detail. The pictures hosted through this site get reduced in size and a lot of the detail get lost.

link to kdog's post
link to the picture





Not carved, this Model 1903 EF Grade was made about March of 1904 so it might be on that rack somewhere, the checkering is higher grade than the other two EF Grades I've seen and might be the 'C' Grade that is listed in the catalogs but never pictured. Almost all extra's available for the 1899's at that time were also available for the Model 1903's.


This is one of the other two examples of EF Grade's showing the checkering pattern they had, Model 1903 Grade B , which is the pattern listed and pictured on the EF Grade's in the catalog's. This rifle is not all original, it's got a later barrel that is over polished and then nickle plated, Savage did not list nickel plated barrels as an option. the magazine is also of a later vintage than the receiver. The barrel is 1914 or later with the longer forearm that was introduced then.