Iver Johnson and H&R by same manufacturer ?

[Gordon]

I would like to know if for the Iver Johnson Trailsman 66 .38 S&W and the H&R Defender are made by the same company ? Or were they just the same designer or what ?


which do you think is better and why ? I collect these things, they seem too close to be coincidence !

 

[Gordon]

 

[DocRock]

Iver wore it better.

They are remarkably the same.

I am of the understanding that all of the H&R top breaks were built in-house. It seems entirely possible that H&R might have contract manufactured for IJ but I don’t have anything to back that speculation up. I quite fancy that Trailsman!

 

[nofendertom]

Why does the front sight on the Defender have the red on the front ?

 

[Jim Watson]

IJ and H&R were close competitors in the second tier revolver business.
I doubt they were in cahoots, these are just form follows function, convergent evolution, etc.

 

[Gordon]

A little bit closeJim

 

[Rubone]

Look at early S&W and Iver Johnson top breaks, they look almost like clones, but no relation to one another. Those companies did not collude, the similarities are due to basic engineering practice.

 

[SwampWolf]

I would like to know if for the Iver Johnson Trailsman 66 .38 S&W and the H&R Defender are made by the same company ? Or were they just the same designer or what ?

I've often wondered the same thing-clones come to mind.

 

[jar]

I have never heard H&R and IJ being connected BUT just as in so many industrial segments of the period there was a lot of just close enough to avoid losing a patent case and employee transfer between companies in the same fields.

 

[ECVMatt]

I can't answer your question, but those are some nice looking revolvers. I can remember, as a kid, looking at the top-breaks they had at Big5 Sporting Goods and always wanting one. The H&R 999 was my top choice! When combined with a Hunter 1100 snap off holster, it just looked like it was meant to have adventures with.

 

[TTv2]

I've always had a preference for H&R given that its origins involved a member of the Wesson family and former S&W employees. H&R was making revolvers for over a century and they were a fairly prominent manufacturer of arms during WW2 and continued to be a producer of military rifles up to Vietnam.

In no way am I denigrating Iver Johnsons, I'm sure they were as good as H&R's were, but I see so many more H&R gun than I ever do IJ's and the Handi Rifles and single shot shotguns have been used by hunters and sportsmen for decades. The 999 top break .22 is perhaps the most sought after .22 top break revolver of all time and the company left a mark on history with the advent of the .32 H&R Magnum, which was having a bit of a resurgence lately thanks to the .327 and the re-introduction of the .32 revolver for conceal carry.

H&R was a prolific arms manufacturer in the US, they just never made the same quality product as Colt, S&W, or Ruger ever did and because of that people seemingly view them as junk and they most certainly were not, they just weren't Colt or S&W and were never going to last as long as those guns did.

 

[Buckeye63]

My brother owned a H&R Defender... he and a friend would handload for it , I can’t remember bullet
weight 140 -150 ? I know he wanted heavier bullets .. It was light recoiling .. and accurate for what it was. He had the revolver for 20yrs never heard of any problems .... heck he may have it stuck back in one of his safes ,,,,
Im going to check

Id like to see a few new production top break

 

[Coyote3855]

I don't know enough to answer the OP's question. My first handgun was an IJ Trailsman 66 .22. It went back to the factory twice and the indexing problem was not fixed. Both sides of every charge hole were peppered with firing pin strikes. Quality control may have improved since 1958, but I won't touch anything by that maker even though I think the current company has nothing to do with the original.

 

[Gordon]

I don't think there is a current company

 

[243winxb]

Up to 1980, there is no connection .

HARRINGTON & RICHARDSON, INC.
Location: Madison, North Carolina
One of the oldest manufacturers of firearms in the United States. Original Harrington and Richardson started in 1871 and was in existence until 1986. For all those years, the company was located in Worcester, Massachusetts. After the original company closed, in 1991 a new company, H&R 1871 was formed in Gardner, Massachusetts. In 2000, H&R 1871 was purchased by Marlin Firearms. The assets of Marlin, including H&R 1871 and its subsidiary, New England Firearms (NEF), were bought by Remington in 2007. H&R's corporate office is now located with Remington and Marlin in Madison, North Carolina, while the production facilities are at the former Remington plant in Ilion, New York. New England Firearms brand has been used for marketing some H&R products in recent years. See separate listing under New England Firearms (NEF). H&R ceased production in 2015

 

[SwampWolf]

I don't think there is a current company

Not the same company (i.e., Iver Johnson Arms & Cycle Works, Middlesex, New Jersey) but Iver Johnson Arms, Inc, Rockledge, Florida was established in 2006. This company got on the 1911 pistol bandwagon and manufactured an assortment of 1911-style pistols and imported shotguns made in Turkey. They also made or imported derringers. Last I heard, they are still in business (or at least were so until relatively recently).

 

[Monac]

There was no connection between Iver Johnson and Harrington & Richardson. Simplified copies of the S&W Double Action 32 and 38 became essentially a generic product by the 1890's, and it is difficult to tell them apart by eye until you become familiar with the grips and other minor details. Even these 1950's/60's versions somewhat resemble each other, for the same reason that small frame S&W, Rossi, and Taurus 38 snubbies all used to look much alike; as Rubone says above, they are doing the same thing in pretty much the same way.

PS - I will say that it is strange to me that both these top break revolvers have a manual ejector. I don't know why this was ever a popular feature on top breaks, because it gives up automatic ejection, which was, to my mind, a significant advantage of the top break revolver. Maybe by the 1950's, manual extraction seemed like a high-class feature, since it was standard on Colt and S&W swing-out cylinder revolvers?

 

[dickydalton]

"Hammer the Hammer" Iver Johnson patented the first transfer bar in the 1800s.

 

[Gordon]

There was no connection between Iver Johnson and Harrington & Richardson. Simplified copies of the S&W Double Action 32 and 38 became essentially a generic product by the 1890's, and it is difficult to tell them apart by eye until you become familiar the grips and other minor details. Even these 1950's/60's versions somewhat resemble each other, for the same reason that small frame S&W, Rossi, and Taurus 38 snubbies all used to look much alike; as Rubone says above, they are doing the same thing in pretty much the same way.

PS - I will say that it is strange to me that both these top break revolvers have a manual ejector. I don't know why this was ever a popular feature on top breaks, because it gives up automatic ejection, which was, to my mind, a significant advantage of the top break revolver. Maybe by the 1950's, manual extraction seemed like a high-class feature, since it was standard on Colt and S&W swing-out cylinder revolvers?

If you look over both the Defender and the Viking .38 S&W snubbies, as I have and start measuring things you really get puzzled because they are so similar except for stylistic features . Seems like a cross over in engineering for these two 50s-60s designs if you look closely. My Defender has a slightly better finish and is slightly beefier in certain places that really don't count than the Viking (Trailsman 66) but startling similar. Just wondering as they are NOT copies of any modern S&W or Colts and differ radically from their earlier top breaks they produced.

 

[jar]

If you look over both the Defender and the Viking .38 S&W snubbies, as I have and start measuring things you really get puzzled because they are so similar except for stylistic features . Seems like a cross over in engineering for these two 50s-60s designs if you look closely. My Defender has a slightly better finish and is slightly beefier in certain places that really don't count than the Viking (Trailsman 66) but startling similar. Just wondering as they are NOT copies of any modern S&W or Colts and differ radically from their earlier top breaks they produced.

Likely simply stylistic influences. Here is my pre-"Defender" name and pre-model number version most likely made in 1938. You can see the early versions were very very plain. This one is serial number 234.

 

[Monac]

Those are wonderful photographs, jar. Thanks for posting them!

Just to be detail oriented, that is an early WWII style H&R Defender. The later-war version had an adjustable rear sight like the Model 999. It may have had a different front sight, and maybe internal changes as well. The US government bought a lot of both kinds, for issue to armed guards in the US, and for the small arms issued to Liberty Ships.

 

[jar]

Those are wonderful photographs, jar. Thanks for posting them!

Just to be detail oriented, that is an early WWII style H&R Defender. The later-war version had an adjustable rear sight like the Model 999. It may have had a different front sight, and maybe internal changes as well. The US government bought a lot of both kinds, for issue to armed guards in the US, and for the small arms issued to Liberty Ships.

Yes, it is pre-war as I said most likely from 1938. It's from before H&R started the year markings in 1940. It is not yet a "Defender" or "model 25" and pre-dates the name and model.

Here's an image from Jim Hauff showing his example. Mine is slightly later with a serial number of 234.



Like his, mine has no model markings or model number.

 

[mnrivrat]

As said, no affiliation with each other. They had an ugly gun contest and they both won.

 

[dickydalton]

Ooops.

 

[243winxb]

Shot my dads H&R back in the 1950s. Age 10?

First thing i learned- Dont place 2nd hand over the barrel/cylinder gap to steady it. Ouch.