My friend brought over a old 22 Rifle he has to show me. He picked it up back in the early 1980s from a police auction in Detroit.
It is a Stevens Marksman single shot. It has a round barrel rather than octagon.
After tightening a few screws I was suprised at how tight it still locked up. The bore is fair and it should still shoot well. There is a stamped M 352 on the bottom of the receiver. Is this the serial number? Any idea when it might have been made.

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Believe this is the #12.
Built from 1911 to 1930.

terry

Fun little rifles and decent shooters too.

It's marked 'J. Stevens Arms Co.' That's supposed to be a post 1916 Stevens 'address'. (...Arms & Tool Co. /or A&T before then)

But Stevens guns made after '16 are known to carry early markings too.
So it's just a general guide to when they made some of their stuff.

Savage bought out Stevens in 1920. They kept the Stevens name of course and continued production at Chicopee Falls. Most of the Savage production Stevens guns will have a Savage proof mark on them,,,'S' in a circle usually on the frame. But again not a 100% certainty when they started using the mark, or that all production received the marking.


Ser# is stamped on the bottom edge of the frame. Some people will say it's an assembly number and not a ser#. But everything I've ever read said they were ser#'s,,and I've never seen repeated numbering which assembly numbers can be.
Anyway, no records available on Stevens production. All their records mysteriously went up in flames just as the Gov't was about to audit and investigate Stevens WW1 defense contracts just after the War. Then Savage bought them in 1920 and they say they don't have any records of production either AFAIK.

The pivot pin and 2 screws that the link, lever and frame connect to form the over center cam lock up are the weak point of the action. They are small diameter and generally soft steel.
When they wear, the action will not lock up tight, lever will drop of it's own weight, ect.
The repair is to replace of course. Slightly oversize is better but takes some work on the parts to fit.
Simply turning the link pin that connects the barrel sleeve to the link and the 2 screws (one that connects the link to the lever,,and one connects the lever to the frame) will bring up a clean, unworn surface to the locking system again and all will be well for a time.

Wear eye protection when shooting these as there is nothing to stop gas and debris from a ruptured case from coming straight back.
The firing pin itself is held in place with a small dia intercepting cross pin and in a very worn gun, I've seen those firing pins able to be taken right out of the breech block w/o removing the cross pin.

Nice rifles, getting hard to find now especially in clean condition.
Used to be a common Boys Rifle and you could buy them cheap at shows and flea markets.
I think they cost nearly as much as the Favorite when new. That was quite a bit of money back then.

Thank you gentlemen for the information. I will pass it along to my good friend and make sure he brings it over next week to shoot.

evil single shot assault rifle,ban it for the publics safety

Yesterday I got my Stevens Marksman back after 40 plus years. My elderly dad came across it, buried in a closet. My S/N(?) is 353. (the preceding letter may be a "T") I shot it back in the early 70's and it was fairly accurate. Looking around the Internet i haven't found much on the Marksman. Any info is or will be appreciated. I have several pics that I just took, but working with an iPad, I have no idea how to post them :-(

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MoreAmmoNeeded!!!

It looks like the one I have, and I'm trying to find info also!

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MoreAmmoNeeded!!!

Here's a little read.

NRA Museums:

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Psalm 23:4

Its fun to get a few different ones. The pumps are nice too.

I have the Stevens, 1894 Hopkins & Allen, 1906 Remington like yours..

Some are called rolling blocks others are called falling blocks. I don't know what the other actions are called.

I thought it was silly for me to dabble in these old 22's but when the new grandson arrived I got interested there fun to shoot too.

yeah kind of neat li'l gun i had mine for over 55 years it has a very low sn 76 it shot really great back then the hammer spring and now a few parts have either broke or got lost some time ago am trying to put it back into shape looking for parts will find som on web sites

I own two Stevens .22 rifles from the early 20th Century - a Favorite and a Visible Loader pump. I went to the trouble of researching both of them thoroughly for writing articles, and verified that the alphanumeric stampings on the receiver's lower stock tang are in fact assembly numbers rather than serial numbers. Trying to discover the age of these guns involves having an intimate knowledge of manufacturing changes and other markings. Even then, only a general idea of when a Stevens .22 was made can be guesstimated. I am reasonably sure that the same procedures were applied to this gun, as Stevens would have no need to apply two different protocols.

John

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- Cogito, ergo armatus sum -

I had a little Sevens rifle similar to that one a few months ago.
It had a plank stock that appeared to be pine, gun was 85%.
I think it was marked Stevens Maynard Jr. Took it in at show
and traded it off few hours later. When lever was dropped, barrel
tilted down to load. Think it was octagon at breech, round
barrel. Had crude sights, non adjustable.

I read stories of the youngsters taking these rifles to school and hunt for supper after school got out on the way home. These little rim fire rifles fed families back in the day. Of course this is late 1800's / early 1900's.