Blast from the past, I was just looking at Chadicks old website on the internet archive wayback mahine a few days ago. Never had any dealings with Herschel. I'm surprised no one took over the shop, as their name was well established in the fine gun world. They seemed to always have a revolving inventory of Parker guns.

https://web.archive.org/web/20020605.../employees.jpg

"Chadick's, Ltd. was founded by Herschel Chadick in 1976 after three years active part time trading firearms. Herschel was a local East Texas boy from Pioneer stock. While in college, at Texas A & M at Commerce, he met and married (1956) the former Bette Tinney of Winnsboro, TX and worked part time on his father-in law's chicken ranch. After graduation he was employed by Texas Power and Light in Terrell, Texas. Herschel was a bird hunter - other obligations permitting - and admired fine shotguns. One year he got a little bit ahead on finances and bought a nice Parker. All his hunting cronies greatly admired his gun and a few made offers to buy it. The following April came and there was a tax problem. Bette suggested that he might just sell his Parker. Reluctantly, he did, and at a profit. In July he bought another Parker and the cycle repeated itself. Thereupon, a light went on in Herschel's head. Buying and selling fine firearms was a lot more fun than generating electricity. After a few years as a hobby and three as a part-time business he left the corporate "rat race", against the strong advice of his wife, father-in-law, and T P&L supervisor, to form Chadick's Ltd. He has never looked back. " I've met many fine people in the gun business. It's so much fun, you just can't call it work."

Chadick's, Ltd. specializes in fine double barrel shotguns and rifles. Herschel buys and sells a full range of high quality firearms - double shotguns, double rifles, bolt action rifles, antiques, sporting accessories, and memorabilia. Chadick's, Ltd. is located at 119 E. Moore Ave, which is old Highway 80 in the middle of Terrell in the downtown business district - just east of Dallas. Hours are 9 am to 5 pm by appointment weekdays. Saturdays by very special appointment on occasion. You should definitely visit his shop - an experience akin to visiting the "Mecca of Doubleguns". The photograph below does not do it justice, but it is the best we can do on the Internet."

I visited the shop once many years ago; anything they sold was way above my pay grade but the experience was pretty overwhelming as I recall.

Kevin and I were privileged to view some of Herschel's records of A1 Specials that were represented as original but weren't. Too bad, because he had originals as well as those that weren't.

When I was just starting out in the late 79s, Herschel was one of my best customers. I sold him several 20 gauge VHE guns that appeared later as higher grade guns. There are still a few of them floating around still. I don't know who was doing his upgrading, but the work was very good.

I remember probably in early ‘90s at the Louisville show handling a 16 H&H Royal at his table. Price was $12,500, I thought that was outrageous ��.

I only had one dealing with Herschel ,I always liked the LC Smith guns and in our neck of the woods when I was younger you very seldom ran into any one carrying a Parker Shotgun but there seemed a good supply of Smiths ! I had about a dozen or so and I had been admiring a OO Framed Straight grip 28 Gauge VHE that had a set of Briley 410 tubes with it that Steve Barnett had for sale , Steve wasn't much interested in trading any of the Smiths so just for curiousity sake I called Chadick's and happened to get Herschel on the phone. I ask him if he would be interested in purchasing all the Smith guns and we went over what I had and he said sure ,he would send me boxes and shipping labels and I should pack them up ,send them to Texas and he would give me a price for the lot of them , we had discussed a Ball Park Figure and shortly after he recieved the guns ,I got a call and the offer exceeded the Ball Park by a couple of Grand ! I recieved the check a few days later cashed it added a little to the Chadick money and contacted Steve about the 28 Gauge , I told him I would like to purchase the gun and would like a three day inspection ,Steve said I'll do better than that ,I'll ship you the gun and you hunt with it a couple of weeks and if you like it ,send me a check and if you don't just send it back !!! I couldn't believe that, I had never done business with him but he knew he had a fish on the line and he also knew he had me once I had it in my hand !!! Two Great Guys to do business with !!!!

Great story!

You have to be a real beagle to sniff out any of the old collectible guns. They end up online for all the money and sum! Some of the specialty shows like Ohio Gun Collectors is still a good place to look, you must be a member or one time guest to get in.

To date I've recorded 102 Philadelphia Arms Co. guns from serial number 16 to 1846, with seven being B-Grades, six C-Grades, one D-Grade and two E-Grades both for directors of the company - P.F. du Pont & C. William Haywood. The rest A-Grades. Then just to confuse things a single gun in B-Grade livery has surfaced with ejectors and serial number in the 26xx range.

Dave, keep collecting that data, but consider putting it in a book. You amaze me. Thanks for your dedication.