Mark – very enjoyable video.  I’ll not be as judgmental to those who did some of the old gun repairs.  I’m sure that back then, concerns about impacting the, “collectability” of some of these old working guns would be incomprehensible to their owners.  A gun was a tool and it only had value if it worked.  I suspect that the emergence of repeating rifles posed additional challenges for the blacksmiths with rudimentary tools and probably not a working base of knowledge for complicated and intricate actions.  Take the Colt Lightning for example.  Even in current times, getting one to cycle and feed poses significant challenges to gunsmiths with the latest tools.  I suspect that back in the day, many repeating rifles spent the end of their lives being used as single-shots.

Oh how much I’d love to go through the stuff in that building.  Where I grew up no one tore down their old barns and out buildings.  Eventually they were nothing but a heap of wood and memories.

 Mark, I enjoyed your video and I see how independent a Western Ranch was. Talk about jack of all trades, you break it you fix it. Thanks for the insight. T/R

Most gun owners in the West had few other choices than the local blacksmith.  If they were lucky or had money they had access to some of the ones we had talked about in a previous topic about famous gunsmiths in the West.