Not beautiful but has character and still shoots fine, sorry, it is raining out, Winchester Model 61, S, L, LR:
It belonged to my uncle who was killed in a military accident in a B17 in WWII. Like all the guns I got from my grandfather and father, especially my grandfather, they were used to put food on the table. They were tools, not toys to hold and pet and wax on about walnut and blue on the www. If my grandfather could have gotten a stainless rifle or a plastic stock, he would have and he would have used it no doubt to paddle his pirogue. This one has taken many a squirrel and rabbit and it was carried in the humid and wet cane breaks and hardwood bottoms of Louisiana and was surely used as a paddle a few times and it shows it.
I will get around to cleaning this rifle up a bit. Not a complete restoration as I do not want to remove the finger prints and wear marks but my grandfather would use spar varnish to provide a weather shield and paint the entire rifle, wood and metal, entirely with several coats. I will remove all of that, clean up some rust and it should continue another lifetime or two.
So a little story on this one, my sister, probably sixth grade, had a little party and her friends were over for a sleep over. That morning they went down to our dock to look pretty and do girl things. I heard a commotion and some screaming and they were all running up the hill to the house. A big alligator had taken to sunbathing on our dock and would not go away. Now, alligators, less than six feet are just big lizards and I just grab them by the tail and toss them in the water and send them on their way but this one was a bit over that magic six foot number and had an attitude so seeing I was not going to grab this one by the tail I yelled for my grandfather! My grandfather came running with the Model 61 and laid down the law. That gator became some wallets and belts and maybe a pair of boots
, protected at that time or not.