Black powdah ‘Bucket List’

It was a GREAT weekend, as I attended the annual Colonial Trade Show in Portsmouth, NH where many fine builders and sutlers were on hand. The show was larger this year ... and if they didn’t have it ... you didn’t need it.

With that said, my ’BP bucket list’ is almost complete. I commissioned Brian Anderson of VT to build me a 58-cal rifle version of the John Alden "Mayflower" gun (actually built by Beretta in the 1500s) using wheel lock ignition from a The Rifle Shoppe parts lock kit (which I actually got in less than a week from them ... and that’s another success right there!).

When done, my black powdah collection - all shootable - some original, rest replica builds, will span all BP ignition types (less a miqulet) going from the:

- 1360 Tannenberg Castle hand gonne

- to arquebus to matchlocks of tiller & trigger function

- to wheellock to snaphaunce

- to flintlocks, spanning from late 1600s of 75-cal and 60” barrels to your typical Golden Age flint longrifle, and then

- up to and including an original in the lineage of the LAST of ths flintlock evolution, the Hall breech loading flintlock rifle of patent date 1811.

I do have one ‘cap gun’ that I enjoy shooting, a replica US Civil War 58 rifled musket, but I like to focus on the earlier BP arms.

It was a good weekend!

I was there too, and was pleased with the number of vendors there. The show was much bigger this year and there were some new vendors there. I saw a very nice .32 long rifle that i was lusting for, but the price was out of my league. Just goes to show, you can't look at the Cadillac if all you can afford is the Chevy.

I, too, was in attendance. Great get-together. Didn’t buy any guns but walked in with trade goods and walked out with a few items I didn’t need but sure did want! You might say we both shifted our ballast...

Flint62Smoothie said:

With that said, my ’BP bucket list’ is almost complete.

Click to expand...

Then it is time to start another list...

Once my squirrel rifle is complete, and I build the rifle my son wants, that's pretty much it for me. I have a .54 caliber Lancaster, a poor boy 20 gauge smooth bore, and now the .32 caliber Verner styled rifle, all flintlock. Oh yes, and the two factory guns I have, a Lyman GPR, and a T/C Renegade percussion(the first ML I ever owned). Son wants a short barreled full stock, 50 caliber in a bucks county stock. About the only other BP I'd consider would be a matchlock fish tail musket. I started to build a lock from a picture I found online. Pretty simple mechanisms matchlocks. Some day I plan to complete one.

Pretty short list:
Shoot a flintlock
Own a 20ga Fowler flintlock

Well, I'm limited out up here. Cant dream up any more excuses for what I think I need to build. My wall is full of guns. I refuse to lock them in a safe just to have room for more builds.
Even the one hanging alone on a different wall, a simple GPR 54. It's in the way of the next heat pump install, and is just too darn accurate to sell off to make room. Not sure where to put it when it has to come down in a couple of months.
Now, powder horns........ that's a whole nuther bucket list. I can paint the walls with those.

Having completed a .62 cal flint 'canoe' gun, ( 20" GM bbl, Pedersoli longrifle lock from Crewdawg, m4 stock from Track and hand forged furniture) I have yet to finish a .36 cal .42"x 13/16" barrel (Rayl, West by God Virginia) SMR w/walnut from a friend's Ozark farm, percussion lock from a trade in Missouri furniture by my own self and a couple small details from Track. It's about 85% complete. Next a .40 SMR for my friend Terry who donated the walnut, Rice .40 x 3/4" x 42" barrel, L&R Durs Egg lock, Davis triggers, cm2 precarved Southern Mtn. stock by Pecatonica (Delayed by the blizzard/flooding) and furniture from various dealers. And a long barreled 1/2 stock southern mountain 'Bear' pistol w/18"x15/16" Lyman .50 cal barrel, large Siler percussion lock, Kentucky precarved stock from track (Ordered a cm1, has as much curl as my cm4 canoe gun, Thanks Track!) and furniture by myself and scrounge. That's about it for the for seeable future. The pistol looks like a real 'duck stomper' in the vernacular of the peasantry, heh heh. Hope to shoot a limit of venison bearing quadrupeds with it this season. Also finish my personal M'ic M'ac pipe of Stearite, and I'll be a happy camper. Thanks to every body in the Forum, these projects have a high probability of success! The Best, George.

I do not need anymore stuff. (But somehow I always manage to acquire more stuff). But as unlikely ( and legally) unobtainable as it sounds, my bucket list item would be a traditional 18th century style European hunt for Reh, or even Rotwild or Damwild with one of my flint Jäger rifles. In country. But I just do not see it in the stars.

I can settle for an eventual rotwild or a damwild here on my family’s exotic ranch in it’s stead. Much cheaper and doable.