Whipped Cream Difficulties

Since I’ve been blogging for 15 years, why not?

And what better kind of party to throw than…a gun book party! Because a gun book party don’t stop until we’re out of gun books, and I don’t see that happening. But I did run out of time to get this post up on Sunday, so I’m moving the party to Monday night instead.

Also, I’d like to get some more gun books off the kitchen table and reduce the stack before Someone Who Isn’t Me (SWIM) gets sprung from durance vile and returns home. After the jump…

Firearm Design & Assembly: The Inletting of Gunstock Blanks & Modifications of the 1903 Springfield, Alvin Linden. Small-Arms Technical Publishing Company, Georgetown, South Carolina, 1941. Riling 2367.

Firearm Design & Assembly: The Finishing of Gunstocks and Conversions of the 1917 Enfield Rifle, Alvin Linden. Small-Arms Technical Publishing Company, Georgetown, South Carolina, 1941. Riling 2366.

I can dispose of these two fairly quickly, as they are duplicate copies of two that I already have and have written about before. Both of these include the pattern sheets (which were missing from my copy of The Finishing of Gunstocks), so now I have a complete complete set of Linden Samworth books.

These also feel a little nicer and less fragile than my existing copies. I am thinking the reason for this is that they are not as old: The Inletting of Gunstock Blanks and The Finishing of Gunstocks both have an April 1952 ad page date. Smith does not document this state. He does say that some of these later editions were sold off by Stackpole, but those have Stackpole labels and price stickers: The Inletting of Gunstock Blanks has a price sticker pasted on the front cover (over the printed price), but The Finishing of Gunstocks does not, and I have not found a Stackpole sticker yet.

These are very nice, with little wear. I can see just a little bit on the corners and some at the bottom edges if I squint a little, but I think I could call these near “fine”. I’m still not going to handle them any more than I have to.

I am still looking for that Stackpole single-volume compilation mentioned in the other post. I asked Callahan and Company about that. They said they’d never seen a copy, and, as a matter of fact, had forgotten it existed until I mentioned it. That’s now on my want list with them.

Firearm Design & Assembly: Checkering and Carving of Gunstocks, Monty Kennedy. Thomas G. Samworth, Georgetown, South Carolina, 1952. Too late for Riling, but listed in Biscotti (as are the Linden booklets).

This book completes the Firearm Design & Assembly set, though it didn’t come out until 1952. That was very close to the end of Mr. Samworth’s publishing run. There were two more books after this one, and I don’t know why it is listed as “Thomas G. Samworth” rather than “Small-Arms Technical Publishing Company”.

Mr. Samworth, I guess, hired Mr. Kennedy to complete the set after Mr. Linden’s untimely death. There’s not a whole lot of biographical information about Mr. Kennedy in Smith, other than he was “a top-flight professional gun-stocker” (quoted from the Samworth promotional material). The ad page date is January 1952, which I think marks this as a true first per Smith.

This is also oddly bound. It isn’t like the Linden pamphlets, which are soft paper bound. The binding on this is very stiff pasteboard. Still “softcover” by my definition, but not as fragile as the Linden books.

I want to call this “fine”. Much like the Linden’s above, there’s a tiny amount of wear if you squint. I thought from some cues inside, and that black binding, that it might have been re-bound at some point, but Smith’s photo and description say it came this way. So I’ll go with a “fine” copy of a 72 year old softbound book.

Gunstock Finishing and Care, A. Donald Newell. Small-Arms Technical Publishing Company, Georgetown, South Carolina, 1954. However, it has a 1949 copyright date: Smith documents a second printing (also listed in Biscotti) with the 1954 copyright date and a 1954 ad page date, but the ad page in this one is not dated. Riling 2685.

I’ve only flipped through this, but it seems to be what it says on the tin: once you, as the professional gunsmith (or dedicated amateur) finish your gunstock shaping, carving, checkering, inletting, and everything else, what varnishes and finishes do you apply to your stock to make it look outstanding? What’s the best way to apply them? And where do you get varnishes and materials (circa 1949-1954)?

This is 473 pages plus the index and ads. I get the impression that, if it isn’t in here, it hadn’t been invented yet. Smith has no biographical information on Mr. Newell. I get the impression that Mr. Newell spent a lot of time not just finishing gun stocks, but talking to other gunsmiths about the way they did things and what worked for them. He even mentions talking to gunsmiths from “the old country” about techniques they had used many years in the past.

I think this copy is “good”. There’s a chip at the top of the spine, another at the lower left back corner, and some noticeable edge wear at the top front. But I think this is in good shape for a book that is a) 70 years old, and II) was probably used as a reference by some gunstock finisher, so it is surprising that there aren’t a lot of stains from dribbled or spilled varnishes or varnish ingredients. Smith suggests (and I agree) that this was a “working” book, not a “shelf” book. And if you’re not into gun stocks, but are into cabinet making, or bookshelf making, or other woodwork, this might come in handy.

These four books were bought together from Callahan and Company for $225 (plus shipping). The two Linden books were $45 each, which would have made the other two $135, but I don’t recall the individual prices and don’t want to go upstairs to dig out the old catalog. If I think of it, I’ll update here. (C&C did have a copy of the other Linden book listed, but they had sold it by the time I emailed them.)

Next time, I have two more Samworths and two more O’Connors from my book buddy batch. I also have something that doesn’t fit into either category, and some (relatively) new books by a recently deceased author. So we’ll see how things go.

Oh, and before someone asks: by my count, I now 24 out of 47 Samworth books in the original Samworth printings, plus a few in reprint editions that I haven’t replaced yet. So…halfway there…ooooo…livin’ on a prayer…

This entry was posted on Monday, July 29th, 2024 at 7:00 pm and is filed under Books, Guns, Hoplobibilophilia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.