Winchester 1st Year Model 61 with Extra Markings. Your Thoughts?|Winchester Rifles|Forum|Winchester Collector

Bill, subject to being overruled by somebody who knows better, the first thing I notice is the serial numbers appear to have been roll marked before the gun was blued, which I believe Schwing wrote was standard processing for the Model 61.  [My library is in storage so I’m relying on what’s left of my memory after 80 Winters.]

Conversely, the extra marks appear to have been applied “through the blue” because of the ghosting that surrounds each number. 

The mark on the side of the receiver might be a foreign proof mark although I thought those were usually applied to the barrel.  

The “5353” on the bottom of the receiver might be a supplemental control or registration number applied by a government entity, probably of a foreign country that registers guns that come into the country.  

The above are SWAGs.

With respect to the mark on the face of the receiver that I said might be a supplemental proof: would it be possible to get a high resolution, in focus closeup of that mark?  

There are catalogues of proof marks with which this might be compared if the design were clarified a bit.  

One way to start would be an image search of the Web. If that yielded nothing, a study of the scholarly literature on proof marks. The old Gun Digest editions of the Fifties and early Sixties had relevant articles. 

I have a feeling that. If it’s a proof mark, the “5353” can be more easily explained once the proofing authority (and country) is discovered. 

Edit: ANOTHER THOUGHT.  Given the very early serial, perhaps you should inquire of the Cody’s firearms museum, furnishing them these images, to see if anyone there might have a clue. Perhaps the rifle had been retained for some in-plant purpose before it was sold and shipped.

The Model 61 is highly collectible and surely there are WACA members who specialize in it and are likely to have seen something similar, unless it’s a one-off.

Yes. That’s the one. Nobody at WRA would put a re-work or in-plant inspection mark in such a visible place. 

Nor would a collector or museum do such a thing.

The mark smacks of authoritarian bureaucracy just because of its disfiguring  location, to my eye.

Alternative thought: An agency mark with a “5353” inventory control number. What kind of agency would need/use an expensive .22 hammerless repeater in the Depression Years?