Late G Grade Engraving

[Bruce Day]

1939 gun. 20ga 26 inch.

G grade engraving went through several different styles and subjects. This is the last version. Middle version G engraving is sometimes uncharitably called the flying turnip style. This late G engraving is sometimes called the helicopter quail style. There are not a lot of late G's or late Parkers at all above V grade made during the Depression. I am not putting down G's, I think they are wonderful and highly desirable Parkers, and prices have been climbing quickly.

This is an Ilion gun, but notice the grip cap, which is believed to be as made.

These are also Ilion cyanide case colors. To my eye these , although worn, are muted and close to charcoal case colors, and unlike the tiger striped rainbow case colors that some associate with cyanide colors. I believe the color result is a matter of technique.

[Bill Zachow]

Bruce, the 28 gauge VHE, NIB, with serial 242103, had the same grip cap.

[Bill Zachow]

Bruce, forgot to mention that I owned the VHE I described above.

[ed good]

BD: do the colors on the g grade pictured below look meridanish or illionish ? I say illionish...what do you think?

[Brian Dudley]

What's the S/N. That will tell you.

[Dean Romig]

I have seen three VHE .410 Parkers all with serial numbers above 241XXX and all with the Meriden grip cap.

[ed good]

brian: this is #236xxx and lettered to have been made in November 1935...however, the colors look illionish to me. what do you think?

[Brian Dudley]

1935 was before the move, so the colors are Meriden...ish.

But you already knew that.

[ed good]

brian: then how come they are so bright? just does not look like late parker bone charcoal work to me.

[Brian Dudley]

The colors look just like this 1928 Meriden VH to me.

29803

[ed good]

brian: agreed. did not think late parker colors were that bright...ed

[Dave Suponski]

I agree. Meriden colors had a certain translucence to them.

[Kevin McCormack]

There is no " 'late' bone charcoal work" on Parker Guns. The receiver colors are either original Meriden bone charcoal case colors, done the exact same way (dry powder packing and firing in a furnace) throughout the life of the Meriden Parker Gun, or cyanide immersion bath colors (as opposed to dip bath as on the very earliest Perazzi guns imported into the US by Ithaca in the early 1970s). The immersion bath process gives the array and distribution of colors exactly like Brian's post beautifully shows as opposed to the "tiger stripe" distribution of colors that Bruce Day's post alludes to.

[ed good]

kevin: have noticed that early parker guns seem to have bright colors. later guns circa 1900 had more muted colors. seems to me that the later the gun, the more muted and subdued the colors...cept brian's 1920's example is an exception to others I have seen from that period.