Show me your deer rifles

[DelSnavely]

Well I don't have a photobucket acount, so I'll put a link to my pics of "Ol' Buck" at the end.

Ol' Buck has an interesting story. I hope you all don't mind if I get long winded...lol

First, let me say, as a child of 4-11, Daniel Boone was my favorite TV show. His rifle was the first gun I remember wanting and this rifle was my first longrifle. I got it from a guy in AZ that goes by Rev. He didn't know much about it, since he just bought it to resell. It was clean but looked like it had been stored in a barn with hay and oats stuck in the wool gun sock it came in. When I got it the first thing I did was take it apart to clean it. That's when I saw the builder's name on the bottom flat and the year it was made. Here are the rifle specs..

.45 cal., 44" W.M. Large bbl (on top flat)
(Ted Fellowes, Seattle 1966 218 (on bottom flat)
14" LOP
Plain maple stock
Brass furniture
Single trigger
Brass front sight
Steel rear sight
No patch box

Bottom flat says "Ted Fellowes, Seattle 1966" and has the number 218 etched into the barrel.

I contacted Ted Fellowes and he told me that he made very few longrifles, especially with 44" barrels. He also said that when he finally felt that he was good enough at making guns to sell them, he started his serial numbers at 200, to make it look like he hadn't just started. That makes this rifle his 18th professional job. Ted has since quit making guns "I believe" in the early 80's. He has a book he kept records in, but it's been so long he can't find it. When I talked with him last year, I believe he was 85.

About a year after getting this rifle, I bought the entire Daniel Boone series on DVD. In the second season (airing about 1966) there is an eppisode called "The Gun". In this eppisode, Daniel walks to PA to have a new rifle made. The rifle he describes to the gun maker fits this rifle exactly.

The way I see it, the rifle I've wanted since I was 4, just fell into my lap 45 years later. I took a small 2x2 muley last year with it and I'm using it this year as well.

Thanks for your patience...lol

Ol' Buck

 

[shortbow]

Very cool to see you hunting in your period regalia. That's the way it should be done, imho. It always seems so incongruous to see fellers hunting with great looking old time ML's but dressed all in camo and/or blaze orange.

 

[hanshi]

I have a 20 yoa plus Traditions version of that rifle. Yep, cheap. I've used mine to kill lotsa deer with prb. A super bad weather gun. :thumbsup: