Regarding Beautiful Hunting Rifles

JLS said:
A gun is a tool. It should be balanced and functional, just like a good pair of boots. But, it has no soul and no karma. It’s a device that serves a purpose.

Now hunting dogs, they have souls.
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I like art, but I don't have much hanging on the walls. Art for it's own sake implies a certain level of disposable income. I don't think that is a bad thing or denigrate anyone for it.
I need art that functions. I also see art in taking that black and stainless instrument and making it into the exact tool that fits me well and functions flawlessly.
 
JLS said:
But, it has no soul and no karma.
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I will agree with the latter and disagree with the former.

I have a savage 30-30. It's ugly so not really applicable to the thread. It was my great-uncle's in the 30s and 40s. He was a poacher, who fed a community with deer, rabbits, bear, and squirrels during a depression that didn't let up for decades after the "rest of the country" was no longer struggling. There's an old picture somewhere with that gun leaned up against a old model T with 8 deer strapped to it. Later in life he was getting hard on money and sold it to my Grandma for $30 and a half gallon of moonshine. She hunted with it until about the time I was born, harvesting a buck every year. She gave it to me when I passed hunters ed. I killed my first too bucks with it, then in high school, thinking I knew everything and was god's gift to the outdoors, I told her I was saving for a new rifle, one I could shoot further and could better kill elk with. She smiled and said, "Just remember, than gun has killed more deer than you've seen." That gun has soul to me.
 
neffa3 said:
I will agree with the latter and disagree with the former.

I have a savage 30-30. It's ugly so not really applicable to the thread. It was my great-uncle's in the 30s and 40s. He was a poacher, who fed a community with deer, rabbits, bear, and squirrels during a depression that didn't let up for decades after the "rest of the country" was no longer struggling. There's an old picture somewhere with that gun leaned up against a old model T with 8 deer strapped to it. Later in life he was getting hard on money and sold it to my Grandma for $30 and a half gallon of moonshine. She hunted with it until about the time I was born, harvesting a buck every year. She gave it to me when I passed hunters ed. I killed my first too bucks with it, then in high school, thinking I knew everything and was god's gift to the outdoors, I told her I was saving for a new rifle, one I could shoot further and could better kill elk with. She smiled and said, "Just remember, than gun has killed more deer than you've seen." That gun has soul to me.
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I bet you could take a scraping off the stock and do a DNA test on it that would test positive for your family.
 
neffa3 said:
I will agree with the latter and disagree with the former.

I have a savage 30-30. It's ugly so not really applicable to the thread. It was my great-uncle's in the 30s and 40s. He was a poacher, who fed a community with deer, rabbits, bear, and squirrels during a depression that didn't let up for decades after the "rest of the country" was no longer struggling. There's an old picture somewhere with that gun leaned up against a old model T with 8 deer strapped to it. Later in life he was getting hard on money and sold it to my Grandma for $30 and a half gallon of moonshine. She hunted with it until about the time I was born, harvesting a buck every year. She gave it to me when I passed hunters ed. I killed my first too bucks with it, then in high school, thinking I knew everything and was god's gift to the outdoors, I told her I was saving for a new rifle, one I could shoot further and could better kill elk with. She smiled and said, "Just remember, than gun has killed more deer than you've seen." That gun has soul to me.
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And that gun is beautiful.
 
JLS said:
My synthetic stocked center fire tools were made in America.
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I really do get the merit of a synthetic stock. I have two such rifles. Also I have a Safari grade Browning with gorgeous highly figured French walnut stock. It took a lot of work $$$ glass bedding the barrel channel to have it right on stable but it is now such that POI never moves.

Ohh that rifle is made in Belgium.
 
BrentD said:
Of course it's a tool. I don't think anyone disputes that. But it is much more than a tool to many of us. While some may collect framing hammers and crosscut saws, you don't see anyone agonizing over refinishing and recheckering the wood, much less upgrading it to quarter sawn English Walnut and applying 27 coats of hand-rubbed witch's elixir for a perfect finish nor polishing metal to 1200 grit for a flawless bluing. Nor does anyone engrave them with pictures of construction site dogs and roofing trusses. Nor are there nearly so many websites devoted to them in all their technical intricacies, histories, and tradeoffs in capabilities etc.

If it's just a tool, then I'm sure yours bounces around in a tool box between your pipe wrenches and lineman pliers, eh? :)
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Like Pinocchio, guns start out as objects. Along the way, a shooter may connect w a gun, enhance it, team w it for adventures, celebrate it in stories, pass it along, and some of the shooter will merge w the gun. Making it a Real Gun, in the perception of that shooter.
 
Alright, minor thread detour or at least a swerve around some potholes.....what about traditional bows vs. modern compounds? Tools? Handcrafted, functional pieces of art? Soulful? Hmm....I have a really sweet reflex-deflex longbow that is way cooler to handle and shoot than my techy Hoyt compound. But I also a 1000x more accurate with the Hoyt....

There is something very cool about a truly handcrafted longbow or recurve built just for you.
 
Scene: Venice, ca. 1540

“These kids and their damn wheellocks. My trusty arquebus is all I need.”

Repeat ad nauseum and ad infinitum.
 
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Being where I am on the calendar, I have come to appreciated more the things old. Wood stocked rifles fit in that category - even a very basic, functional rifle looks better to me in wood. As to weight? Worrying about 2# on my rifle is silly if I can drop a stone or two off my arse.

I find I like the stuff, it's part of the process, part of the pursuit, and my old timey things help connect me to my grampa's day a little bit. A beautiful rifle is part of it - whether it is my ornate flintlock, or my wood-stocked Ruger 77 - that old timey beauty is important to me.
 
I appreciate beauty, and wood, and nature, and hand craftsmanship, and fine craftsmanship, and nostalgia, and quality, and I despise the “throw away and replace” type mentality that is overcoming us these days BUT, when I’m hunting, I need my rifle to go where I need to go and do what I need it to do, and I may need to set it down in a rocky area to adjust my pack or grab a snack, or I may need to go through brush, or it may rain on me and I might not get back to the truck for 3-5 days. It’s not as pretty, but for getting the job done, AND for ease of repairing cosmetic issues, stainless steel and fiberglass just can’t be beaten.

My wife’s Sako L-579 Delux that my grandpa gave me is scratched to heck. Why? Because I figured he’d rather I used it that left it in the closet.
 
Beauty is as beauty does. I like the nice rifles with great wood. They require more care than plastic and stainless guns do, but they are worth it.

They also need to be hunted and not stuck in a safe somewhere...


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Ugly has it's place too. Even an ugly baby's mother thinks it is cute...


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shrapnel said:
Beauty is as beauty does. I like the nice rifles with great wood. They require more care than plastic and stainless guns do, but they are worth it.

They also need to be hunted and not stuck in a safe somewhere...


View attachment 245385View attachment 245386View attachment 245387



Ugly has it's place too. Even an ugly baby's mother thinks it is cute...


View attachment 245388
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I am trying to remember. did you send me photos of your father with horses a long time ago ?
 
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