Your intro to Parkers and your first Parker
 

Thought it would be interesting to hear how people first got acquainted with Parkers and what there first Parker was.

My first intro was at a little rural gun club in central Texas back in 91. I was shooting skeet with the old timers who taught me. I was shooting my 1100 12ga and they were mostly shooting Superposed. One of them brought an A grade Parker. To this day it is one of the most beautiful guns I have ever seen. Definitely the most beautiful case.


My first and only Parker was purchased about a month ago. Made in 1921 VH 12ga 32" barrels.

i was at a tradeing post in the 80 s and i found this old parker ph grade 10 ga 32 inch barrels..traded for it and its been my main turkey gun for some years..since theni have added a few parkers to it...charlie

My first Parker was a 0 Grade Lifter made in 1877. I got a letter for it that even listed the purchaser's name and hometown. The 32" 'Twist' barrels were quite pitted and the top rib had some issues. Brad Bachelder did a nice job giving the barrels a new lease on life. I bought the gun a few years ago from John Puglisi. It eventually went back to him in a swap for something else.

I lived in Keene ,NH next to a retired New England telephone repair man named Louis Goland---my mentor. At the age of 7 (1946) he gave me a Parker, VH, 20 bore of which I still have today along with other guns that he willed to me upon his death . Louis also gave me my first Brittney ---Belle---.

Needless to say I have been hooked on Brits and Parkers ever since .

Allan

When I was old enough to shoot trap, I used my grandfathers SC SBT. He always shot a LC Smith Olympic SBT. When I moved to Harrisburg, I wanted to start shooting trap again. He gave me the SBT. Later before he passed away I bought his 12ga PH with Parker Steel barrels. It was his hunting gun. I still have both guns.

For my Dad's sixteenth birthday, his father's cousin took him to Meriden and bought him his first, a VH 16. He also had an uncle, still living in Meriden, who gave him a T Latch Lifter. I traded that for a First Model S&W .22 when I was 16. I still do stupid stuff, all the time.

1964 picked up a vh 32", I suppose F&F. Took out back and fired it 4 times at an empty hulls on the ground. Had shot trap for 3 years and knew to check POI. Was my first double trigger gun. Went duck hunting the next morning and killed a double with it first two shots. Thought it pointed better than the Mod 12 I had used for ducks till then. Kept it a few years and traded it for a vh 20ga. that's still around here somewhere. In my town in the 60's, 20ga's weren't sought after much, think I gave mabee $10.00 boot on the trade. Don't get out for quail much anymore but when do, I shoot it. It is all beat up but still can hit a quail with it. JH

This story has been told before, but here it is again. In 1960, when I was 14 years old, I was shooting skeet at our local Izaak Walton League range. Another young man the same age was shooting a 28 gauge VH Parker. We traded pleasantries and I asked if the gun might be for sale. He said he would like to trade it for a Savage Model 99. When we determined what the price of such a gun would be, I discussed the deal with my Dad. My Dad would not get involved, but fronted me $130 to close the deal myself. I had been searching for a suitable 12 gauge Parker for some time, preferably in a similar price range. However, the little 28 ended up being my first Parker. Yes, I still have it, 54 years later. Some weeks or months later, I visited a local gun shop and looked at a very nice DH 12 gauge. The shop owner told me that he had been offered a 28 gauge VH a while back, but was hesitant to deal with the young boy who offered it. Oh, well.

My first Parker was a 12 ga Trojan that I bought when I was 17 out of an estate sale for the sum of $50 (1972) I knew even then it was a steal............... But I sold it when I was in college to pay some bills, and I made a huge profit on it, sold it for $400 two years later, Man I wish I still had that gun....:crying::crying:

Well we all do stupid things, This might top them all, I was in a gun shop looking to buy a shotgun for a customer of mine for Christmas, Bought the Ruger, and was looking around and the store owner ask if I liked 20 gauge guns, I told him I did not own a twenty, He went to the safe and brought out a CHE 20 gauge with 26, or 28" barrels I can not remember now, they were Acme I remember because I thought that was a very generic name, took the gun home and for some reason just did not like it, took it back to the dealer and traded even for a PHE with Steel barrels in 12g a this gun was in very good shape with case and barrel black, I parted with the PHE a fews years ago when I sold the P grade collection, Sure wish I had that little 20, I have the serial number somewhere will try to find this gun by posting the number should be interesting, Gary

I have mentioned all this before too but I like reminiscing. I had a keen interest in guns & hunting at an early age, bought my first Gun Digest in 1954 at age 7, knew a little about Parkers back then, their high status anyway. My first shotgun in 1960 when I reached 13 was a field grade LC Smith 12 gauge, always loved doubles. Even passed up a 410 VH priced at $69.95 in the late 60s because I didn't have the cash. Have traded alot of nice guns since then but always thought Parkers were "above my pay grade" and did not acquire my first until about a year ago, a VH 12 (on my avatar). I decided after I got it to really splurge and have added 2 upgrades and 8 repros over the past year.

I think I have told this story here before but as Forrest said reminiscing is good for the soul. It's been near 30 years since my first Parker. It was a 1913 12ga 28" Trojan I purchased from my local gunsmith, Victor Strawbridge, in Dec 1984. I really did not know very much about Parker's and I had not read Johnson's or Baer's books. An older friend who did a lot of upland and duck hunting, who also had a Brittany, Barry Weeks, had a 26" barrel 12ga Trojan, he spoke very highly of Parker's. Barry's father was friends with Burt Spiller. I never owned a double gun but after hunting with Barry I wanted one of my own. In Dec '84 I was getting ready to leave for an assignment to Iceland and I had sold my Jeep as I would not need a vehicle on a remote radar site. I used some of the proceeds to buy this gun. On the morning I left for Iceland I woke up early, went to a favorite spot on a brackish river, the Bellamy, which feeds into Little and Great Bay NH. It was low tide and I managed to make sneak on a raft of ducks. When they flushed I dropped a black duck but couldn't figure out the double trigger in time to get a second shot. I went over and picked the big red leg and while I was holding the duck I saw a small flock of mallards dropping in about 50 yards away. I rested the forend on the top of my left forearm while still holding the black duck and folded a green head with my second barrel. First two shots, two ducks, Parker's are certainly special, you can't tell me otherwise.

I still have the gun which was in great condition when I got it, 65 to 70% cc. Near twenty five seasons of salt water gunning and laying in muddy cornfields took it's toll. In 2007 I drove out to Ilion on my 50th birthday with Scott Kittredge and I had Larry DelGrego & Son restore everything but the cc which is still a strong 50-60%.

this parker idis will cause you to do crazy things..i had a good 1955 ford 2 door sedan that i traded even up for a parker 20 ga v grade and a parker d grade 12 ga..and that was this year... charlie

My intro to Parkers was my Dad's black friend, Plez Holmes, who had a Parker with Damascus barrels. I remember he brought it on a dove hunt. Dad and several people around town offered to buy it from Plez but he refused. The barrels didn't blow up on him either. I actually tried to track the gun down a year or so ago. It seems the gun is now owned by a son but they aren't selling.

My Dad had a 28" Trojan which he bought as a kid in NJ. I would just stare at that gun and thought it was the coolest gun he had. He eventually let me use it when I found a property on MD's eastern shore that was loaded with quail and I just had to shoot those birds with a SxS. It was M/F but what did I know. Killed a bunch of quail with that gun and that started my passion with Parker's. In 1973 or 74 a gentleman named Howard Donahue had a small gun shop in Towson, MD. and I had just bought my first MEC reloader from him. I noticed on the gun rack a Parker, GHE, with 2 sets of barrels. Of course I asked him if it was for sale but he said no, it was his favorite hunting gun. A few days later he called me and told me he had just got a Parker in on consignment and that it was very nice and that I should come over to look at it. Well I rushed over and he pulls from the back of the store a mint Red Head LOM case and inside was an equally mint Remington Parker, 30" straight grip, checkered butt, BTFE. I bought it for the princely sum of $650. Still have that gun and my Dad's Trojan. But the best part of this story is the friendship that developed between Howard and I. He became my mentor in many things; shooting, hunting, women and good bourbon. He flew B-17's in the 8th AF over Germany and eventually authored a book on the Kennedy assassination. With out a doubt he was one of the most fascinating men I ever met. Thanks Howard.

My Grandfather was a trap shooter and bird hunter. When I got interested in hunting my Mom would tell me stories bout his guns and how much he loved his Parker. Unfortunately my Grandfather died before I was born and all his guns were given to friends or sold. At a gun show I saw a Parker Trojan 12ga. I was about ready to graduate from Michigan State at the time and Mom and Dad bought that gun for me as a graduation present. I traded it for a VH 12 then traded that off for a Grade 5 Browning 20ga O/U which I traded off for something else. Years, no decades went by before I got the Parker bug and bought a DHE 20 from Cabelas in Owatonna MN on my way to Wyoming to shoot Prairie dogs. I still have that 20 but I wish I had the Trojan back.

I had already graduated into hunting with SxS guns, 30 plus years back, but my hunting partner had a Parker. With this in the back of my mind, I ran accross a table at a gun show, maybe 25 years ago, a young man was selling off his recently deceased grandfather's collection of assorted and sundry stuff, and lo and behold, there's a Parker on the table. This was mostly a black rifle type show, so the Parker was not getting much attention. I picked it up and noted it was Damascus BBL'd. When I asked the young man if he was aware that it was Damascus, he said "just give me $250.00 and it's yours".
Okay. Now I owned my first Parker, which turned out to be a beautiful, unmolested GH 12 ga from the late 1880s. I was clueless, but my hunting partner told me I did okay.
BTW, I still have that gun.

You guys have some wonderful stories thanks for sharing. I came to Parkers very late as I am 64. I have been a Fox man for a very long time as my mentor Bill Towner introduced me to Fox guns and duck hunting in 1965. All my resources went towards my Fox obsession and later Elsie 10 bores. I started thinking about Parkers about 4 or 5 years ago. How nice it would be to display a nice Parker with my "The finest Gun in the World" collection :rotf:. I purchased The Parker Story and joined the PGCA; I was hooked! I purchased my first Parker at a small country auction about three years ago, a well used but honest CHE with beautiful Bernard barrels. I have added 3 more to my accumulation. Someone please stop me!!

Daryl, I know your friend Howard Donohue but I can't quite place him. Is he a member of your gun club? What was the name of his business?

Pete, my friend, that is "quit a mug shot":rotf:

. Someone please stop me!![/QUOTE]



Sorry Craig, too late for that. Just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Bill;
Yes, Howard was a member of Loch Raven for many years and shot at National Capital back in the 60's. His shop was called Donahues Gun Specialties located in Towson. His work on the Kennedy affair drew national attention and he even appeared on Good Morning America. I'm sure if you googled his name and Kennedy you would get a hit.

Well my little hunt put me behind that morning, my ride to Logan had arrived and he was hurry up you got a flight to catch. That was a long day and a very rough flight to Keflavik Naval Air Station. We hit so much turbulence luggage was falling out of the over head bins on top of people. Arrow Air military charter, a very tired DC-8.. A year later I took Arrow Air home, two days later Arrow Air went down on takeoff in Goose Bay Labrador with 250 or so troops from the 101st Airborne, all hands lost.

thats a mighty nice gun pete has i hope it gets to hunt another 25 seasons..and yes pete takes a good picture...charlie

I've told this story before - in fact, I wrote about it "A Last Trojan Pheasant" in Parker Pages back around 2006 or so, but I can't find which issue it's in. Anyway, that tells the whole story plus a lot more.
I think it was around 1960 or '61 and I was thirteen and I was at my friend Dave's house and as we went down into his cellar one day I discovered this leather-trimmed canvas case tucked in behind the chimney. I pulled it out and opened it and took out a really nice Trojan 12 gauge with 28" barrels and the hang tags were still tied to the handle of the case. It had belonged to Dave's grandfather up in Saco, Maine. Long story made short - I was allowed to keep that Trojan at my house and use it whenever I wanted to until I moved to another town three years later. Then after high school graduation Dave took a job as a lineman out in Boise and brought the gun with him and I haven't seen that Trojan since the day I gave it back.

That three year period in my life instilled in me a desire to have my own Parker someday - a Parker I could really enjoy for grouse and woodcock in Vermont..... and now I can't even decide which one to bring with my when I go there, so I just bring a few along.

Interesting to read how many people started with a Trojan, since their introduction in 1912 to this day it seems they are a gateway for many to the higher grade guns. I still treasure mine as much or more than the others I have for the memories it brings, plus it has always been a good shooter.

Growing up I heard many stories of Grandpa's Parker, but he lived in Minnesota and we were out in Washington. Grandpa died in 1954 and his Parker went to my Uncle Howard. My Father was a Winchester rifle guy, but a Remington shotgun guy. He had a pair of AE-Grade Model 1894s in 12- and 16-gauge and a 12-gauge 30-inch full "Sportsman" autoloader he bought for $38 with his employee discount at Seattle Hardware in 1938. He always talked about how he would have loved to have bought the Parker that was in a Seattle Hardware window display, but that would have been $100 with his employee discount!! Tough when making $35 a week! In 1959 my Father succumbed to Jack O'Connor's short barrel writings and the "Sportsman" got whacked to 26-inch with a Poly-Choke. By 1960 the "Sportsman" was gone and he had a 12-gauge, 30-inch, 2-frame, VH-Grade, which remained his primary waterfowl gun until he quit hunting after the 1987-88 season when he was 80. According to the Ron Kirby letter I got on my Father's Parker it was shipped to Seattle Hardware on July 2, 1902, five years and one month before he was born.

Dave's Dad's Parker sounds like the more than a few William Wagner Parkers that Kevin McCormack and I have bought in the Washington, DC area. Sometimes these guns don't get far from "home".

My first Parker is a Trojan 20 gauge, but it is also still one of my nicer ones, being restored by Del Grego and still in good restored condition.

My Dad took my $130 first Parker to Del Grego's while I was in the Army in the late sixties. I wouldn't trade the relationship my Dad started with Larry Del Grego Sr. for my gun to be in original condition. My 28 gauge in Del Grego restored condition has more history behind it than if it were in original condition. This gun is pictured in Larry Sr's hands in Kevin McCormack's article in DGJ about the Del Gregos. I have been shooting that gun for 54 years and it still has the early Del Grego colors in about 98% condition.

My first encounter to the World of Parkers started as a boy about 5 when my father taught me about firearms safety. He had bought a Parker 12 ga. GHE at the NYC auction of the Arthur Von Briesen Manson. He and a neighbor bought the 2 double barreled shotguns without knowing what they actually were, only advertised as quality American doubles. After the auction, they picked up their guns only to find that they were consecutivly numbered GHEs in 12 and 16 ga. My father wanted the 12 only because he had his Win model 24 in 16 and the neighbor wanted the 16 because he already had a Fox Sterlingworth 12. Then for the next 40+years they tried to buy each others gun. Never happened.Now, for the past 20 years or so, I've tried to buy that 16 from his oldest son who said our daughters would have to work out a deal when we are gone. But I still know where it is. There are no records on either gun even through Bob Beach. They are in the 208 range and nothing is found. DelGreco probably can help but is unwilling so it will remain an undiscovered part of Parker history.

My first experience with a Parker was in the 70's at a turkey shoot. The Parker kicked all our butts. At the time I shot a Winchester Model 97 trap grade with multi barrels. My friend had a Marlin goose gun with a 36 inch full barrel. We could not touch the uniformity of pattern of the Parker. I have wanted a Parker ever since.

The serial number of that 20g a CHE I mentioned here earlier was 127741 anyone own that gun out there? Gary

I didn't get my first Parker until in the late '80's or early '90's: An ad said a VH 30inch "Turkey Gun." That piqued my interest, as by then I knew Parker never made "Turkey Guns," so I called the guy who said the gun had been used by his father for ducks & geese all his life on the Chesapeake Bay. But with steel shot regulations, he couldn't shoot it anymore. I bought it for I think around $700. I took it hunting, & my son flushed a quail that flew by me. I shot, and killed it, and thought "Well, I'll be damned." The gun had too much drop, was choked too full, had too many triggers, and LOP was too long, but the Parker & the quail didn't know that. Then, it happened again, and I thought "this is a lucky gun." I traded that gun for a prettier single trigger repro; killed ducks with it, but learned the error of my ways, and I now have a 12 Ga 32" VH, and a 28" 28Ga Repro, both double triggered, and Love them.

I've never had the inclination nor the income to be a "collector", so my guns are all shooters, and lower grades at that. Most even have a minor issue or two which helped bring them down to my pay grade. I've always loved Foxes and 16ga's in general, and am lucky enough to be the caretaker of a few. A few years ago I thought it would be neat to have a Parker in a cabinet as well (seems like I read something similar father back in this thread!) and looked at a nice restocked Trojan 16. Unfortunately I dawdled and someone else ended up with it. I was still kicking myself when another Trojan 16 surfaced; someone had polished the action so I made an offer and was amazed when it was accepted! It's been my only Parker until the infamous SBT I've posted about elsewhere. I like to think of myself as an indiscriminate appreciator of 16ga's, however, so if an LC Smith or NID falls into my lap, they'll probably go into the cabinet as well.

The little 20 gauge
 

When I was growing up in Idaho everything was Browning, I knew only one person who had a double and he was my Dad's boss. It was a gold engraved Fox and man could this guy shoot it. I had no interest in S x S until a friend talked me into going to a California S x S shoot. I was amazed at all of the high end guns that I saw, but they really weren't for me---until I shot one.
At some point later there was an ad in the local paper for a 20 gauge Parker . It was about 6:30 in the morning and I rang that guy's phone. Come on out, he said and I still remember my heart and the car racing for the next 30 minutes until I got there. Out of the closet the guy fetches a 30" 20 gauge VHE in reasonably good shape and he said his son was about 12 and his wife wanted all of the guns out of the house. I was really sad about that statement, knowing there was a young boy that was going to miss his chance at the shooting life and especially with a Parker, but took it I did and off to work I went. Later that day one of my friends called me to tell me there was a 20 gauge Parker in the paper, but I told him that someone already bought it. That was several Parkers ago....

It is a rare good feeling when a friend tells you about a great gun for sale that is already "Home" at your house.

Great combinations Brits and Parkers, will bring you a lifetime of joy!!!!

George, I couldn't agree more.

Great photo!!! The Parker is nice too:):)