Not many days ago, when Dellet posted a reference by the former Chicopee Falls Town Historian to this document, there was a discussion about how best to obtain a copy of it, when there seemed no easy means of contacting either the retired town historian or the Chicopee Hist. Soc.

At the same time, there was a debate about the earliest source for knowledge of the mysterious fire that destroyed most Stevens records, Jay Kimmel's Savage & Stevens history being cited for documentation for the event:  "Jay Kimmel goes into great detail in his history of Savage-Stevens Firearms... His work is highly regarded by Savage and Stevens collectors."  Although I requested a summary of his documentation, it was not provided.

So I bought the book.  Kimmel's "great detail," the part he wrote himself occupies two pages; the remainder of the Stevens section consists of reprints from well-known books & articles by DeHass, Serven, Sharpe, etc. (most of which I obtained soon after their original publication).  But among these reprints is included the 1942 "history," anonymous, but perhaps composed by a Stevens employee for the benefit of the War Dept. because Stevens was then engaged in building Enfields for Britain; anyway, Springfield Armory Museum now houses it.

"Anonymous" wrote nothing about the fire, but Kimmel added a footnote that constitutes his SOLE reference to the fire.  HIS source for this info?  Grant!

I give up--after trying to make it copy a half dozen times, & getting the same error message.  I can at least send it as an email attachment to anyone who cares to read it, & perhaps knows a better way of posting it.   

Rebel wrote on Aug 30^th, 2018 at 9:45pm:


It is jpg (not that I pretend to understand the meaning of that term).  I'll look for the "reducer," not that I know anything about that either.

slumlord44 wrote on Aug 30^th, 2018 at 10:28pm:


Will do.  Prepare to be underwhelmed.

Incidentally, "anonymous" seems to have forgotten when the invasion of Poland, & the beginning of WWII, occurred...though it had only been 3 yrs before he wrote his "history." 

And Kimmel put the Czar in his grave a year prematurely.

Bill Lawrence wrote on Aug 31^st, 2018 at 9:07am:


Very kind of you to say so, but VERY far from the truth, because almost every day, life demonstrates to me unmistakably that t'aint so.   What is true, however, is that I most certainly strive to get the facts straight, & am skeptical about unproven statements based on no more evidence than a third party's bare assertion, which usually goes something like this: "trust me--though I wasn't there, didn't see it myself, I was told by unnamed parties such & such is true."

Re-reading the 1942 document, I see that I misinterpreted the remark about the start of WWII--merely one of the most important dates in world history; that wasn't the error of "anonymous," it was the error of Kimmel himself, who inserted that bit of ignorance into the text of the document.