Just got a letter back on a 99G in 250-3000. It was shipped to Sears on Oct 9, 1929.

Stock market crashed 19 days later on Oct 28, 1929 - where it dropped 13% in one day. The slide continued for almost 3 years until summer of 1932, when it had dropped almost 90% from the peak.




Oh, I'd love to hear the stories this gun could tell. Mailed direct to somebody through the mail, no messing with FFL's or background checks.

It's not a good picture, but it's survived the last 93 years in good shape.

Hey don't knock it, my house was a Sears mail order house in the late twenties.

I wonder what $100 invested in 1932 would look like today?

How about $1000?

Sears was most certainly the 'internet' ordering of old. I miss the old catalogs, guns, filling out order forms and waiting 2 months for the call that you could go to Sears and pickup your order.

Not sure about guns , but probably not houses. Min is balloon framed.

If Sears didn't go WOKE early on there would be no Amazon.

??

Your Dow Jones graph is interesting and looks a lot like what we went through in the first decade of this century. I guess what goes around comes around, and around, and around..... Yikes. Whats also interesting is that it took until after the Korean War for the Dow to exceed its immediate pre-crash (1929) value. I wonder how much an investment in 99s in 1932 would yield today? If I remember correctly, according to Murray there were less than 3,000 serial numbers issued to 99s in that year.

I just did an inflation calculation for a 99G from 1927. At a suggested retail that year of $49.50, adjusted for inflation now would make it around an $830 gun. What's a really nice 99G in 300 go for now.. double that? So your spending money would have doubled after 96 years - but if you'd bought an average stock it probably would be up 10x. More if it paid good dividends.

I have my Grandfathers 99 30-30 that he bought from Sears in Chicago in 1927(I Think). He got his Sisters "employee discount". I think I have the original Bill of sale.....
I'll have to get a letter on it. It's a takedown, no checkering, and what seems to me to be a fairly heavy and short barrel. I don't think he hunted more than 3-4 times with that little Rifle......I do have a mounted 6 point Whitetail he killed in Wisconsin with it! I have a Lightfoot mount for it, just haven't made time to put it on , scope it, and take her hunting.

As far as the Sears houses go, Sears almost went broke from those. They were sent out as complete kits and buyers could pay the kit off in installments. As you can guess, many houses never got completely built and it really wasn't feasible to "Repossess" the unfinished kits. Sears also didn't have an attachment to the land the house was being built on!
The little town 0 or so miles NW of Chicago I grew up in had 6-8 Sears houses and a friend of mine grew up in one. His Father knew a lot of the Sears House history.

An interest bearing account at 10% doubles in 7 years. I would have thought after 90 years it would be worth more!

830-bucks. Now that would be considered a good price for a nicely preserved 99 of that vintage today. Taking into consideration the 1K threshold that so many of these guns exceed these days it looks like an investment in 99s in 1927 would have beat the rate of inflation. Or put another way, better than money in the bank. But maybe not as good as an investment in average stock.

$100 invested in the Dow Jones Industrial Average back then would be worth almost $34,000 today. The makeup of the Dow is much different, but if you stayed with the DJIA as your portfolio, you'd have done pretty well.

Just an off topic thought regarding Sears, Sorry
charlee