Nice rifles, and great stories!
Any chance you could post pictures of the Pope scope rings and mounts?

fascinating and well researched Marlin story

Aaron

ron wrote on Dec 4^th, 2020 at 2:23pm:


Thanks. ASSRA is welcome to use any of this, but probably seen enough now that maybe it's not worth taking up Journal space? But I sure don't mind if they used it.

What really great stories and some fine old iron photos. Thanks for posting them all. Really enjoyed the surplus mania as I went through the same thing. My best friend's dad worked on Governor's Island off the tip of Manhattan when it was an active army base. Since all the men on the block were WW2 vets, a lot of GI gear came our way and my friend's dad somehow provided us with M1 carbines to play army with. Bolts were removed but I remember them being pretty cool. We literally had a playground of over five square miles of fields and forests to play army. Great times, but sadly it all came to an end when the city sold it off to a developer who put in tract housing. I still have my uncles helmet and my dads web gear etc. to remind me of my militaristic youth. Can you imagine five 9-11 year old kids in web gear and helmets toting M1 carbines on a suburban NYC street and surrounding woods running around yelling "Kill the Japs!" What did our parents think, I wonder. Probably why we were forced to go to church every Sunday!

Thanks. I've got one more with provenance I tracked, and it will take up a bit more space, and posts. Putting it together, and will post it soon. It's a Pope Ballard.

Wonderful tale Marlinguy. Thanks for posting.

Regards,
Powderman

Nothing as fancy as what you guys have found, never the less. If remember correctly it was a Marlin single shot 12 ga that I found minus the stocks having seen hard use. I approached the Forman of the cattle ranch/ coffee plantation and showed him what I found. He kept it and put out a notice for anyone that had left it, two weeks later he handed it to me and told me no one wants that gun good luck. It started my love with old guns and working on them. I stocked it in Mahogany as it was common in South America. Seems every spring was rusted or broke. Finally found a retired military armorer that showed me how to make coil springs in between buying beer.  That gun saw a lot of use in the jungle before I left Colombia in 1989. I assume some of the American DC3 pilots brought it down after the war, but then who knows.