Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Jack O'Connor .257 Roberts

Did Jack O'Connor ever write an article on the .257 Roberts?

I have "The Hunting Rifle" here and he mentions it only in passing when comparing the .243, although he does say he had shot some deer with one.

I believe he did at least one where he discussed it at length, and talked of using it while stalking coyotes but it been a long while ago.

I just found a picture of a beautiful Winchester 70 in .257 Roberts he had custom made by Pachmayr in 1950.

He mentioned the Roberts quite often as the family had one built on a mauser action if I recall. His wife used it pretty extensively as did his sons and he used it on varmints as well as a few deer. It seems I recall a story of a family trip where his 270 broke an extractor or something so theRoberts served them all to fill their tags.

Jack O'Connor wrote about the .257R in this book,"The Big Game Rifle", saying many positive things about the round. However, he claimed to have hunted little with it himself, but his wife and kids used it a lot. He claimed they killed 30 to 40 head of game without ever losing an animal. The load he mentioned was a 100gr bullet at 2950fps. Apparently he liked the .270R a great deal. So do I.

He did a complete chapter in the Outdoor Life hunting book. It's old and cannot remember the name of it. As a matter of fact, he devoted 1 chapter each to the 250-3000, 257Roberts and the 7x57. powdr

JOC wrote an .257 Bob article in Peterson's Hunting magazine while he was hunting editor. I have a copy stored some where.

Doc

Who?

Whose who? Jack, Bob or Robert?

Carlsenhighway,

The .257 that Eleanor used most was indeed a custom Mauser 98, with a Sukalle barrel and stocked by Griffin & Howe. It's now owned by one of their friends, Buck Buckner, who is also now a friend of mine and Eileen's. We got to fondle the rifle a couple of years ago: It weighs 7-1/2 pounds with scope and still shoots 1/2" 3-shot groups. Eileen did a write-up on it in the August 2013 edition of RIFLE LOONY NEWS.

I believe his wife also had a M70 257R.

Seems like I remember reading his wife shot just about everything in Africa with a 7x57

Eleanor switched to the 7x57 after they moved to Idaho in the late 1940's, because they were doing a lot more hunting of game bigger than deer.

Jack wrote a whole chapter on the 257 in his book "Sportsman's Arms and Ammunition Manual" C 1952 by outdoor Life, if you can find a copy.

Also, he wrote a few paragraphs in his book "Complete Book Of Rifles And Shotguns," this book is pretty easy to find.

According to Mr. Buckner (and he would know) Jack and Eleanor had three 257 rifles, #1 a Remington 30-S Stocked by Adolph Minar with a Noske scope, #2 was a Mauser Sukalle-Griffin & Howe custom Mauser model 93 with a Weaver 330 scope as a lighter weight replacement for the 30-S and #3 was a Winchester Model 70 Pachmayer custom with a Weaver K-4 in a Pachmayer Low-Swing mount.

Okay, now I just have to find some copies of these things..

I have read a story or two also where JOC maligned the 257R but it was really a situation of poor bullet performance. You have to remember back in the early days of his career there wasn't the availability of bullets around that we enjoy today and some of the choices back then were evidently stinkers. I imagine that is probably some of the reason Elmer Kieth developed some of his predujices against small high speed bullets. Tha TS not the case anymore. In another thread the question was what has been the most significant improvement for hunters in the last 50 years? Though 50 years only goes back to the 60s now I might content the improvement in bullet technology and scope development. That would certainly be true if it was 60 years nat least for most hunters.
Now I just feel old. Anyway.

Yup,for elephant she used her "big" gun a .30-06 with 220 gr solids.

IIRC, JOC's most extensive treatment of the .257 Roberts was about two pages in his 1961 book; Complete Book of Rifles and Shotguns", #61-6454

True. I have it here somewhere.