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What was your first Winchester purchase?
Looking back do you feel it was a good purchase? Still have it?
Winchester Model 1873 44-40 circa 1886
A box of .32 Special cartridges–so I could hunt with Dad’s carbine. Don’t have them. Threw most of them at deer. Nearly 50 years ago, but still have the antlers and the memories of good hunts with and without Dad.
(That’s not what you were looking for with your question, but Dad is in it, so it is good.)
FromTheWoods said
A box of .32 Special cartridges–so I could hunt with Dad’s carbine. Don’t have them. Threw most of them at deer. Nearly 50 years ago, but still have the antlers and the memories of good hunts with and without Dad.(That’s not what you were looking for with your question, but Dad is in it, so it is good.)
I’d say that was a GREAT purchase providing priceless memories. You’ve been a Winchester fan for quite a while.
Winchester Model 1873 44-40 circa 1886
I bought a second model 73 that was pitted and had cracked wood. I didn’t know a thing about them but I soon learned. The guy I bought it from invited me to his house and started my Winchester education by showing me what to look for and what books to read. He has past away years ago and now I go to the Tulsa show with his son.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
Well, at the age of 11 years old, I purchased a Winchester Model 37, Shotgun. To legally hunt with the following year when I turned 12 and that was 50 years ago.
It was a Model 37, Red Letter, 16 Gauge, 28″ Full Choke Barrel, Small Hammer, Pigtail, that I bought for $15.00.
I used it to hunt everything, small game, and when big game season came in, I used slugs to hunt deer.
As a kid, that just got his drivers license, I took it to a block shoot, I won 7 turkeys and 2 hams with it that day.
It is a long range shooter, as a dime will cover the O.D. of the muzzle.
It has been my favorite shotgun to hunt small game with, through out the years and I still use it to this day.
"I Would Have Rather Lived Through The Industrial Revaluation"
"Instead of The Space Age"
From
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Guys,
The year was 1973, and I was early on active duty stationed at Ft. Huachuca, AZ. I made a trip to Tucson and was in Jenson’s Gun shop when I saw a second model 1873 in generally good condition (mostly ‘patina’) for $200. I bought it and took it back to my BOQ room. It was serial number 83848, in .44 WCF. Years later I traded it off, much to my current dismay. I hope to re find it one day and if anywhere near its old condition re acquire it. I had always thought of the 1873 as the typical “western” rifle from my early TV watching, etc. I had that prior to being married, so have been at this collecting Winchester lever action rifles longer than I had my wife. I still love the 1873’s most of all models. I try to apply the criteria of whether a new prospect “adds” anything to my collection, else I would have a whole lot more of them! Maybe one day I should get out of my 1895’s, the 1894’s, 1892’s, the 1886’s, and concentrate on the toggle link operated models, with a definite emphasis on 1873’s? Naw. I also like others, just not as much.
I might add, that once having that one in hand, I then started trying to find out information about it. Reference books were hard to come by initially. Leroy Merz got me to join the WACA, and I found out about “The Winchester Book” by George Madis. No one seemed able to order it while there at Ft. Huachuca, so when I PCS’ed I was driving on I-10 eastbound to Ft. Gordon, GA. I made a side trip to try to visit George and get his book. He was not at home, nor answering his phone. I don’t recall now how I then obtained the book, but suspect it was while I was in Germany and through the efforts of Leroy.
Thanks for the opportunity to remember how it started!
Tim
Mine was a Winchester model 42 I purchased from a friend who needed money quick in 1968. I still have it and it looks great. Did a lot of hunting with it.
I grew up around Winchesters from an early age, my dad was big into them in the late 60’s and 70’s. The 1876 rifles always caught my eye. It wasnt until about 20 or so years ago that I bought my first Winchester. It was a Model 64 carbine. Neat little gun but I ended up trading it off some years later and havent looked back. I still have the second Winchester I purchased–an 1892 rifle in 38-40 with button magazine and octagon barrel. It was part of a collection that my dad, brother, and myself each bought a few guns from. A few years ago I purchased the rifle my dad had bought back then, an 1894 rifle in 38-55, RB, FM that I have used several times since to take a few deer. My brother and I still have the rifles we bought that day and look back on the experience as one of the more memorable moments we both did something together with our dad.
1892takedown @sbcglobal.net ......NRA Endowment Life Member.....WACA Member
"God is great.....beer is good.....and people are crazy"... Billy Currington
"This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."
Man, my first winchester was purchased only about 8 years ago…..a pre 64 30-30 94 carbine…..only paid 400 for it….just like a lot of others here that one was traded off for another winchester. In hind sight i wish i would have kept it. Now my focus is mainly on 73’s.
After reading some of the posts here where some of you bought your first winchester 20+ years ago. It made me wonder what is the average age of the collector here on the sight. I think i may be one of the younger collectors at the age of 36. Actually 28 when i bought my first winchester.
I purchased a Model 64 Deluxe in the early 60’s. I hunted with it for awhile. Then purchased a saddle ring 94 30-30 in the late 60’s. I hunted with it for awhile. Then a few years ago I bought a Winchester NRA Model 94 Musket. It’s still has not been fired and new (1971 model). I just purchased a 1952 Model 94 in 32 Win Special. I have a mountain lion hunt right after the first of the year. It will be with me on that hunt. I just joined the association and have learned a lot already. Thanks guys.
First rifle ammunition was a box of Winchester Super X .30-30 shells to use in Dad’s rifle for deer hunting back in 1972 for $5.70.Still have the empty box .
First shotgun ammunition.Do not remember.
First shotgun ,Winchester Model 370 12 gauge,bought in 1970.Sold at a later date.
First rifle ,Winchester Model 1886 .45-70,in 1973.Bagged my first deer with this rifle.Still have it,Paid $25.00 ,plus a $25.00 value Cooey Model 84 shotgun.The best gun deal I ever made.
First Winchester I owned was a Winchester/Cooey Model 84 28 gauge that I received for Christmas in 1967.
The first Winchester lever action that I owned was given to me by the owner of a ranch I was working on in SE Oregon back when I was 23 years old (49 years ago) It was a model 1894, 25-35, OB, CB, FM, and was a bit worn. It also had the butt stock broken at the wrist. The previous owner was a sheep herder who trapped coyotes, and rather than shoot them when caught, he would hit them over the head with the butt of the gun. I got a new butt stock from the Herters, put it on, and away we went. I shot a lot of dear with that gun over the years. Some of the shots were unbelievable, and had to be pure luck. I remember one where the buck was bounding away from me at about 50 yards, it was almost dark, and I was trying to get a shot when he came up and into the skylight. 3rd time up, I pulled the trigger…right in the back of the head. I got poor down the road and sold it when I lived in Burns, Or. I have attached a picture of me back then with a big buck and that 25-35. Not a good quality picture for sure. Peter
Wow, great stories! I hoped some of you who have been Winchester collectors for dozens years and/or have dozens of guns would remember your first. Thanks for sharing.
Winchester Model 1873 44-40 circa 1886
I first got interested in Winchester when I was in grad school at Michigan State U back in the late 1970’s when I had a job as a security job at the local National Guard armory. There was an exhibition hall in the building and occasionally they had guns shows. I was real tempted to buy a few OB rifles for about $300 each but just could not “pull the trigger.” Fast forward about 40 years when I hosted the State Photographer of Texas at my ranch near Austin and he showed up with a couple of Model 1892 rifles. Sitting on the front porch with a drink and cigars we decided that I should shoot his rifles. Addiction set in!! I had the perfect place to put some rifles like this to good use on the local hog, deer, and coyote population. I took about 3 months of looking, some research, connecting on this forum and then ran up to the top of the high dive and bought 3 Model 1892 rifles from Tommy Rholes up near Dallas. One each in 44, 38, and 32 WCF. All were OG FM CB standard rifles. Probably paid a bit too much for each but they are in quite nice condition and I still have each of them. See my problem is I have never sold a rifle which I have purchased. The addiction is still there and with at least 100 rifles i can recall just about every one of them that I bought.
Best purchase story is the rifle I was phone bidding on while sitting up in a tree stand with my bow during deer season. There was no way I wasn’t going to end up with the rifle as it fit into a small group of consecutive serial number 1892’s I already owned. I just hoped it would not get ugly expensive. Iwon the rifle and then shot a hog about 20 minutes later. Pretty good morning!
Michael
Model 1892 / Model 61 Collector, Research, Valuation
Wow – this makes me really think. My first Winchester (a 1914 vintage Model 1894 SRC in .30 W.C.F, which I still own), was acquired in 1954 when I was 12. It came from a German immigrant who ranched cattle in Northern California and was a close friend of the family. When he got laid up and no longer was able to work I received the carbine and Dad was offered his horse, Smokey, but as we had no place to keep it, he had to pass on the horse. The next year, my Dad bought me a Model 42 for Christmas and we shot lots of doves, quail, pheasants and ducks together. As I remember, he bought it at Western Auto for about $60. Unfortunately, I traded it in on a Browning Lightweight 20 gauge automatic in 1959 which I still have.
I was given a Model 1892 octagon barrel .38-40 rifle about 1956 for helping my scoutmaster clean out his garage. Poor guy had three gorgeous blond daughters but no sons! The barrel had been cut back 1/2″ so it went down the road at one of the first gun shows I attended around 1985. About that same time (1956), Dad bought me a used Model 1894 circa 1940’s vintage SRC in .30 W.C.F. I shot two bucks with the carbine in 1958/59. I remember trading it in around 1959/60 on a used Model 88 in .308 caliber. Damned thing had a terribly mushy trigger and kept breaking firing pins, neither problem being solvable so it also went down the road about 15 years ago.
Lots of good memories here……………….
WACA Life Benefactor Member
NRA Life Member
Well, not a purchase, but a Winchester.
A ’73 that was my Great-grandfather’s on Mom’s side crossed over to the line of Dad’s side–as in, to Me. Mom’s father thought the World of Dad, and gave the rifle to him. The rifle spent all of my early life and likely the twenty years before that in the back of Dad and Mom’s closet. As far as I know, no one had shot it in over fifty years prior to my first shot with it.
Don’t know how, but when I was maybe fifteen, cleaning the rifles in the house became expected of me–because I enjoyed it. (I won’t tell the story about a spring from Dad’s model 88 (or was it his semi-auto? Oh, well.) flying across the livingroom the night before deer season started. Surely was difficult getting that action back together.) A year or so later, I asked if I could clean Great-grandpa’s rifle. I was amazed at how simple the insides of it were. The next question was, Could I shoot it? We had/have a box of very old cartridges. I was told if a gunsmith checked it out as being safe to fire, I could shoot it.
Drove the twenty minutes (too fast) down to Monroe to Harold McCallum’s. When I asked him if it was safe, he gave me a look of–What kind of asinine question is that! So back home–Mom wouldn’t let me shoot it from the shoulder–I tucked it in a tire in the driveway and ran a string from the trigger. (Don’t worry–I bought new cartridges to shoot. Those older ones are part of that rifle’s history, so they are off-limits.) Pulled the string. It did go bang. I started hunting rabbits, foxes, deer, and elk with it. The old hunters who knew of a .38-40’s true power thought I was making a mistake taking that out for elk. But I was going to head/neck shoot the elk with whatever rifle I carried, so Great-grandpa’s would suffice. A few years later when I moved out of the house, Dad let me “keep” the rifle for him.
Had some memorable hunts with that rifle. Many I can still see and feel, and quite a few of them, I didn’t fire a shot. Good to just be carrying that rifle.
The ’73 will be my youngest sons rifle when he decides I can handle being without it. He shot his first two deer with it, but that is a story for the “Shooting and Hunting” forum.
The first Winchester I purchased was when I was 15. Think I paid $65 for it–.32 WCF carbine. Didn’t have that one too long. After a hunt with friends, I was driving down the hill from their house. Stop sign–and my Winchester hit the hood and scraped/clattered down the street. Never have put another rifle on top of a car or leaned one up against any rig–ever. Ended up trading that rifle with others for a muzzle-loader. Lost my shirt in that trade, but I still have the .50 cal.
It wasn’t until my late 40’s that I walked into a gunshop and bought a Winchester Model 1894 chambered in 38-55. It had a full octagon barrel and was received in warehouse in December 1899, one of the last Model 1894’s of the 19th century. I got the fever then.
November 7, 2015
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My first Winchester purchase was likely some Wildcat 22 ammo. Some of you remember when it was pretty good ammo, had a certain pistol that thought it was target ammo. Won a few plate matches against “better” guns (and ammo) but I didn’t often miss, they generally did.
I don’t think this thread is about ammo. My first Winchester rifle was a 670, poor man’s Model 70, in 30-06. Once I learned to load for it I discovered this rifle was a very accurate sporting rifle. My sight-in regimen consisted of posting a business card at 100 yards. It would always put a round about 1/8″ below center and I would go hunting. One day a bit of rifling let go and an exceptional rifle was soon retired, but only after dozens of memorable hunting trips and harvesting truckloads of venison and a few hogs. This old rifle also taught me to reload, but that’s a story in itself.
A few years ago I heard of the 35 Whelen and a ‘smith who did a fine job of re-boring rifles. My old faithful rifle was reborn in a new chambering and I glass-bedded the barreled action into a Boyd stock. Topped the “new” rifle with a Leupold scope and the old girl filled the freezer again last year.
My first levergun was a Big Bore 94 in 375 Winchester. I bought it because it was (and still is) one beautiful rifle. It’s put a bit of meat in the freezer but it’s a safe queen these days. It’s a 95% post-64 gun and it’s only detractors are sling swivel studs and a little scar from a fall we took near Palo Pinto, TX about 30 years ago.
First collector Winchester? I honestly can’t say. I think it was a circa 1953 94 in 32 Special. Nothing special; just a very clean rifle with an excellent action and bore.
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