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October 4, 2025
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July 3, 2020
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Welcome! This is a great place. Lots of accurate information shared by great people… and one grouch. 🙂 If you can fit the Cody show into your summer schedule, do it! It’s the best 4 days of my summer! Take advantage of becoming a member of WACA… BTW: You are blessed to have a family heirloom… be sure to learn & record as much information as you can to pass on to the generation in your family! Cheers! Ben
November 7, 2015
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Welcome, Michael!
I’m hoping someone in Arizona may have some clues, most collectors keep some records and a few of us do a pretty good job of it. Someone in the family may have those records or know where to find them. From what you said it’s doubtful it was a family heirloom before your great uncle acquired it but we can’t rule that out. How long ago did your grandfather inherit the gun?
Mike
October 4, 2025
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Ben said
Welcome! This is a great place. Lots of accurate information shared by great people… and one grouch. 🙂 If you can fit the Cody show into your summer schedule, do it! It’s the best 4 days of my summer! Take advantage of becoming a member of WACA… BTW: You are blessed to have a family heirloom… be sure to learn & record as much information as you can to pass on to the generation in your family! Cheers! Ben
Thank you! I will look in to the Cody show for sure. Growing up this rifle hung over my grandpas fireplace….it was always just there and one of those things that was often over looked, but was kind of the image of grandpas house. I was shocked when grandma told me that he wanted me to get it. He had 19 grand children, and 40 great grand children…..to chose me out of all of us meant the world to me. I’m so fascinated by the gun. Who knows, it could just be special to him because it was a gift from his brother, but the stories I have heard of the firearms his brother owned that had such historical value to them, it really makes me want to see if this also has history to it. Thank you for the reply and the welcome. I look forward to reading thru these threads and learning what everyone is up to
October 29, 2011
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Welcome to our site. What is the serial number? 44WCF? Many will chime in to help you–Bill
October 4, 2025
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TXGunNut said
Welcome, Michael!
I’m hoping someone in Arizona may have some clues, most collectors keep some records and a few of us do a pretty good job of it. Someone in the family may have those records or know where to find them. From what you said it’s doubtful it was a family heirloom before your great uncle acquired it but we can’t rule that out. How long ago did your grandfather inherit the gun?
Mike
Thank you for the welcome! I believe all of grandpas filing cabinets have been gone thru. I’m not sure on that tho. Grandpa was an excessive record keeper so I’m a little surprised nothing has come up. I will be talking to grandma this morning so I’m going to ask her again on it.
from what I was told, my grandpa bought his house I think in 81. He had to relocated because he took the job of police chief in another town. He had a beautiful huge stone fireplace in the front room, and his brother came to visit. His brother brought this rifle as a house warming gift, and grandpa displayed it over the fireplace. It was up there for so long it, it a lot of times was overlooked, but it was just kind of the staple to grandpas house. He was really proud of the gun. In the mid 2000’s someone came by and asked about it. Whoever that was recommended taking the gun down and putting it in the safe because he said it was too valuable to be in easy reach. Which he’s right for sure but from what I have found on these guns—they don’t hold a ton of value unless it’s the one in a thousand or have factory engravings, which this does not. None the less, it’s still a $1500 gun I’m sure. So after that, it sat in the safe and grandpa would occasionally wipe it down like he would with all of his others.
I’m really hoping someone in Arizona has a record, or even just figuring out when my great uncle got it. If I can’t figure out the guns full story, it would be great to just figure out my family’s story on it so when I pass it on, it can go with it
October 4, 2025
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426crown said
Welcome to our site. What is the serial number? 44WCF? Many will chime in to help you–Bill
Thank you for the welcome. Its serial number is 40785. The letter doesn’t specify the caliber, and I haven’t found any markings on it saying the caliber. So I’m assuming a 44-40. I will post a picture of the sheet in this main thread
October 4, 2025
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May 2, 2009
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The first 73’s Winchester made were only 44 Caliber (44WCF / 44-40) so they didn’t fell the need to mark the gun. Even after the 38 and 32 calibers came out they didn’t mark the 44’s. It wasn’t until about serial 150,000 that they started to mark the 44’s. The Cody letter you have does not list the caliber because it was considered the standard caliber and in the Warehouse ledger which is the only remaining records Winchester had beside the serialization records if any of the guns features were standard they didn’t write them down. That is why the letter does not state caliber, barrel length or receiver finish, because its was standard at the time.
I checked the serial number to my research data base and it didn’t show up so its was probably in his brother collection for some time. I afraid the only source for its personal history would have come from your Grandfathers brother. If the gun had some historical importance I would think he would of given your Grandfather some document. Those documents can get separated from the guns over the years when the caretaker of the gun does not inform a spouse or relative where the guns documents are stored since rarely does someone attach the paperwork to the gun. The only thing I can think of is if you can go through your grandfather papers before they get thrown out. If he had many guns he would of had a binder or folder with any gun documents.
If you want, take pictures of any marking you find on the gun and you can post them or email them to me at the below address so if there are any non Winchester marking that might indicate it being used in some historical setting. The other thing to do is open the cleaning rod slide door on the butt plate and see if there is something other than cleaning rods in there. Someone could of put a piece of paper in there.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
December 9, 2002
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Welcome Michael,
Once again, our resident expert on the Winchester model 73, has done another fine job in his explanation and a few good suggestions.
A nice family rifle handed down to you that is nice to have and keep in the family, as some have said above.
Anthony
May 2, 2009
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Michael,
To dive into what the Cody letter order number can tell us is if the Winchester office records were around that would only get you who purchased and where it was sent but the office records were burnt in the boilers of the factory otherwise they would of been over run with paperwork. Many guns were sent to distributors and dealers and sold from there but your letter does not indicate a multi gun order from just the Cody letter. You can spot special order guns since the gun enters the warehouse and ships the same or next day. Yours is four days later which I can’t say one way or the other what that means. From the guns appearance it does not look like it had Indian use or was in Mexico.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
October 4, 2025
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1873man said
The first 73’s Winchester made were only 44 Caliber (44WCF / 44-40) so they didn’t fell the need to mark the gun. Even after the 38 and 32 calibers came out they didn’t mark the 44’s. It wasn’t until about serial 150,000 that they started to mark the 44’s. The Cody letter you have does not list the caliber because it was considered the standard caliber and in the Warehouse ledger which is the only remaining records Winchester had beside the serialization records if any of the guns features were standard they didn’t write them down. That is why the letter does not state caliber, barrel length or receiver finish, because its was standard at the time.
I checked the serial number to my research data base and it didn’t show up so its was probably in his brother collection for some time. I afraid the only source for its personal history would have come from your Grandfathers brother. If the gun had some historical importance I would think he would of given your Grandfather some document. Those documents can get separated from the guns over the years when the caretaker of the gun does not inform a spouse or relative where the guns documents are stored since rarely does someone attach the paperwork to the gun. The only thing I can think of is if you can go through your grandfather papers before they get thrown out. If he had many guns he would of had a binder or folder with any gun documents.
If you want, take pictures of any marking you find on the gun and you can post them or email them to me at the below address so if there are any non Winchester marking that might indicate it being used in some historical setting. The other thing to do is open the cleaning rod slide door on the butt plate and see if there is something other than cleaning rods in there. Someone could of put a piece of paper in there.
Bob
Hi Bob, thank you very much for all of that information, and running the serial number. That’s really great of you to do. I’ve shined a flashlight down the barrel and in the cleaning rod compartment and there’s nothing there. Cleaning rods are also missing. This very well could be just a gun that my great uncle spotted and thought “I bet Bob would like this” (Bob is my grandpa, not you haha)
I talked with my grandma this morning, and she mentioned that my grandpa and the fire chief at the time were good friends, and he was a gun enthusiast as well, so she’s going to reach out to him and see if the gun ever came up in conversation. Maybe he was the one that cautioned him not to display it.
I would sure think that if there was any kind of significant story to this gun, it would have been known in the family, or atleast my grandma would have known. But then again, my grandpa, with his law enforcement back ground was careful with information. It’s too bad the records were destroyed, if anything it would be a neat part of the story to know who bought or ordered the gun.
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