This has been a not happy week. I was informed that the four churches I serve as pastor decided to hold a vote while I was away at a camp meeting. It is not unusual as a pastor that one will have a few folks who are not satisfied. A group of folks who would like a pastoral change did a little organizing, etc. and by bluster and bluff got a vote taken. They failed. It was close, but they failed, so I will be at this appointment at least to June 2016. My wife is thankful... and so am I. We've had a fair amount of growth in the last three years. Another year or two and I think the churches will be in good shape.
This afternoon I was visiting a church member from the largest church of the four churches I serve. About seven months ago he just about died from blood clots, etc. It took months of rehab. before he could even use a wheelchair. Today I watched him walk about 45 feet from his bed out into the den. We were talking about deer hunting and hog hunting, etc. I told them that tomorrow I had a staff meeting with two of my best friends... Smith and Wesson. It took them a minute but they caught on. Then he told his wife to go get a rifle he had in one of the closets. He asked me what I thought of it and I told him it was the sort rifle I used ot want when I was a Boy Scout standing looking in the window of the Western Auto Store. He then handed me the rifle and a couple of boxes of shells and told me to take it home. How cool is that?
To make a long story longer... it was a old Marlin lever action. The serial number is stamped on the bottom of the tang reads J5249. On the barrel it reads: "The Marlin Firearms Company - EST. 1870.
NEW HAVEN, CONN. MODEL 336 R.C. - .30-30 CAL.
The forearm is odd. The lever action rifles I've seen have a small sort of slim forearm. This one is more hand filling... wider at the bottom. It is missing the elevator for the rear sight. Someone installed sling swivels long ago. The entire rifle has a patina common to old rifles that have been much handled. The screw for the forearm is missing, someone replaced it with a common nail lightly riveted. I don' think it will be much of a problem to remove the nail. There is a little bullseye at the toe of the buttstock. The buttplate is plastic and reads Marlin. At one time it appears to have had a white outline around the buttplate where it meets the buttstock, but that is gone. The top of the receiver is not drilled and tapped. There is a odd pattern milled into the top of the receiver... wavy lines. I've not seen it before. The receiver is drilled and tapped for a aperture rear sight.
Feeding and ejection of live ammunition is impeccable. Not sure how many rounds the gun is designed to hold... maybe five? Very easy to load. Excellent trigger pull... not spongy or gritty but crisp, not at all what I expected from a lever action rifle. The rifle cycles easily, the bolt moves smoothly, the lever is not sticky. When I first looked at the bore, it looked bad. However, I gave it a dose of Shooters Choice on a nice new phosphor-bronze .30 ca. brush... followed by M-Pro 7 and then some light oil. The bore is gorgeous... mirror bright, the crown is nice and sharp.
What have I got? I know it's a 336... but it's not like the ones I've seen/handled in shops and at gun shows, etc. Would love to have an idea of how old it is. Finish is maybe 70%, mostly that patina look. I wouldn't consider letting it go. I've never been given such a gift by a church member. I think it will be great for deer and hogs. I may have to mount a aperture sight to use it since I'm having problems with iron sights since the last go round of surgery. Sincerley. bruce.
This afternoon I was visiting a church member from the largest church of the four churches I serve. About seven months ago he just about died from blood clots, etc. It took months of rehab. before he could even use a wheelchair. Today I watched him walk about 45 feet from his bed out into the den. We were talking about deer hunting and hog hunting, etc. I told them that tomorrow I had a staff meeting with two of my best friends... Smith and Wesson. It took them a minute but they caught on. Then he told his wife to go get a rifle he had in one of the closets. He asked me what I thought of it and I told him it was the sort rifle I used ot want when I was a Boy Scout standing looking in the window of the Western Auto Store. He then handed me the rifle and a couple of boxes of shells and told me to take it home. How cool is that?
To make a long story longer... it was a old Marlin lever action. The serial number is stamped on the bottom of the tang reads J5249. On the barrel it reads: "The Marlin Firearms Company - EST. 1870.
NEW HAVEN, CONN. MODEL 336 R.C. - .30-30 CAL.
The forearm is odd. The lever action rifles I've seen have a small sort of slim forearm. This one is more hand filling... wider at the bottom. It is missing the elevator for the rear sight. Someone installed sling swivels long ago. The entire rifle has a patina common to old rifles that have been much handled. The screw for the forearm is missing, someone replaced it with a common nail lightly riveted. I don' think it will be much of a problem to remove the nail. There is a little bullseye at the toe of the buttstock. The buttplate is plastic and reads Marlin. At one time it appears to have had a white outline around the buttplate where it meets the buttstock, but that is gone. The top of the receiver is not drilled and tapped. There is a odd pattern milled into the top of the receiver... wavy lines. I've not seen it before. The receiver is drilled and tapped for a aperture rear sight.
Feeding and ejection of live ammunition is impeccable. Not sure how many rounds the gun is designed to hold... maybe five? Very easy to load. Excellent trigger pull... not spongy or gritty but crisp, not at all what I expected from a lever action rifle. The rifle cycles easily, the bolt moves smoothly, the lever is not sticky. When I first looked at the bore, it looked bad. However, I gave it a dose of Shooters Choice on a nice new phosphor-bronze .30 ca. brush... followed by M-Pro 7 and then some light oil. The bore is gorgeous... mirror bright, the crown is nice and sharp.
What have I got? I know it's a 336... but it's not like the ones I've seen/handled in shops and at gun shows, etc. Would love to have an idea of how old it is. Finish is maybe 70%, mostly that patina look. I wouldn't consider letting it go. I've never been given such a gift by a church member. I think it will be great for deer and hogs. I may have to mount a aperture sight to use it since I'm having problems with iron sights since the last go round of surgery. Sincerley. bruce.
