Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Who would build O'Connor's rifle?

"The vast majority don't own a book of any sort on hunting..."
That reminds my of an old saying I read somewhere that went something like this "Those that don't read are no better off than those that can't read".

Fred

You ever see the photo of Roy Weatherby handing JOC a Mark V rifle while he is sitting in what appears to be a home living room? The expression on JOC's face is almost as if he discovered a dead fish in his lap. I don't think it is any secret he loathed the California styling of the weatherby with it's white line spacers, glossy finish and radical lines. So, I think he would not have wanted to promote a Weatherby chambering.

Also, JOC didn't use recoil pads on his sporters. I have fired 30-06 and 270 rifles with steel butt plates and can say it is a pretty stiff wallop. Which is the reason why today with good looking functional pads like Decelerator and LimbSaver he may have came around to accepting pads and faster calibers that would be more friendly to shoot.

These are the thoughts as to why I am among those thinking he would have at least tried a WSM. If he tried them he might like the velocity without having to stuff 62/H4831 into a Win case to get enough speed for his 22" barrels, and I don't think he would object to the lighter weight of a shorter action.

aka MKBenenson. To supplement JB's remarks on special custom bottom metal, the earliest I can think of was in the 1920s when Bob Owen of Sauquoit, NY (hope I spelled that right) imported complete 1903 Springfield magazine assemblies from Heym in Germany. These had hinged floorplates and trigger guard bow releases like Oberndorf Mauser sporters, from which they were no doubt copied. An Owen Springfield Sporter is still the Holy Grail for custom rifle collectors. Then in his 1950s book on gunsmithing, Roy Dunlap described using the standard 1903 magazine box to slimline Mausers. Also in the 1950s or pehaps 60s, Griffin & Howe in New York made a neat Oberndorf style separate trigger guard with bow release for Winchester 70. I will have one in my parts box. I remember seeing an early Remington 721, gorgeously customed by G&H, that had a hinged floorplate and guard bow release instead of the factory stamping. They may have been altered Arisaka parts, I did not have the $$$ to buy the rifle and so did not examine it closely, and it was many years ago. Then in the 1960s Holland & Holland made lightweight hinged assemblies for Mausers and I saw one at the Syracuse NY gun show two years ago on a 1917 Enfield. These were finely made. Later on several firms offered dural and pot metal setups for Mauser and Springfield, of very variable quality. About the worst was one from Michaels, with embossed "engraving", the best I have seen are marked "Finland"
and I think came from Flaig's in Pennsylvania. These last are almost good enough to use on a top end custom. As JB noted,
all along custom gunsmiths have been altering magazine assemblies and today there are several makers furnishing custom bottom metal for many of the commercial and military bolt actions. If O'Connor was building a rifle today, he would have many more choices to make than he did in his own era.

Even reading hunting and shooting magazines is relatively rare. Supposedly there are about 15 million hunting licenses sold in the U.S. each year. I once added together the paid circulations of all the major hunting and shooting magazines I could think of and it came out to about 5 million. Most hunters don't suscribe to more than one or two magazines, so my guess is that maybe 1.5 to 2 million hunters actually read any sort of magazine regularly.

Of course, it's kind of leap to assume that just because they subscribe to a magazine they actually read it.

That is true and really funny.....laffin over here!

Why do you(anyone) suppose Dave Scovill never read O'Conner and why would he admit to that?

Which Chic do you speak of?

A sad but true statement. All of my rifle looniness was, and still is, fueled by reading, and I can afford to read about a lot more about hunting than I'll ever actually do.