picked up a rifle which I think is a 44, # on barrel and lower receiver tang is 72616. There is a letter P in a circle on the barrel near the receiver. Needs work,
anyone know what year it was made?

Yes your rifle is a model 44. There aren’t any factory records, long story short there was a fire. There are various ways you can get the date of manufacture pretty close. Seems like a really high serial number to still have a part octagon barrel, is the receiver stamped on the left side with the trade mark Stevens stamping? Is the barrel stamped with Stevens Arms Company or Stevens A&T Company?

As long as the serial numbers match on the frame and barrel, my best guess is that your rifle was one of the last rifles made by Stevens before WWI, say 1915, around the time Stevens was taken over by Westinghouse. Westinghouse made Russian Nagant rifles using the Stevens factory during WWI. Savage purchased Stevens in 1920. Basically model 44’s were made from 1894 to 1932. Savage made Stevens 44’s have the Stevens Arms Company stamped on the barrel, along with a full round barrel. So 1920 to 1932 for Savage made rifles.

Hopefully uscra112 will chime in.