Trying to learn about originality.
 

Here's a link to an auction on GB that ended a few days ago. I have no connection to it except; it was for a gun I wanted to try to win. It was a 16ga. Trojan that I thought looked completely original and in very nice condition. If you would check it out and tell me if you see anything that I should have seen that tells you otherwise. I did not win the gun as I backed out when it went over $1000. I would have bid higher except the seller failed to answer some questions that I had asked days before the auction ended.

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/1146847406

9 out of 10 times I have asked questions, I didn't receive an answer to questions about an item. The few times I got a response they sidestepped info I asked for in their reply. Most auctions don't include info needed to make a good decision as dollar amounts rise during bidding. Hard to drop cash on a complete unknown.
Mattly

To my eye it looks like somebody got a great buy on what appears to me to be an original Trojan 16.

It was offered by Albright's gun shop here in Maryland. They are a reputable dealer and the gun looks to be really nice. Sorry you missed it.

I would gladly pay that price for that gun.

That looks like a dandy Trojan and was a great buy IMO "IF" the barrels had not been monkeyed with.

I would have been all over that like an Italian on prosciutto. If it sold for $1399 it was a steal in my book given you'll spend that for a Turkish SxS that won't be half the gun.

I can tell you of two Trojans 16 for sale in similar condition for not much more than that price. Check out Kittery trading post.

Three or four hundred more is quite a bit more at that price point. I have never seen a used Parker at Kittery in the past 10 trips that I thought was a good deal once I've picked them up and looked close. Maybe I just always hit it wrong.

I agree with you Andy. I live 45 miles from KTP. They have a wall rack that is always covered with a curtain and they just won’t open that curtain. I have no idea why some guns are curtained off. If they want to sell guns we should be able to see them… and Cabela’s, just 40 minutes up the pike from KTP nevef has any decent SXS’s anymore.





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They won’t let you look at them?

Kittery went from an amazing place to an over priced arrogant place, sadly. I looked at a 12g VH in pretty nice condition, 28" barrels. $4700 about two years ago. I told him I thought it was priced above market value and he said I clearly didn't know what I was talking about and he promptly took the next guy in line. I buy socks there, from the canoe. That's about it. And nuts.

That’s good to know. I have not bought from there but I called about a gun there last year and whoever I spoke to seemed like I was annoying them with questions.

That was a very nice completely original gun and was a good buy at that price.

I vote that a future Parker meeting that I am attending someone gives a comprehensive class on how to grade originality and condition. I think that is the biggest barrier for most people.

We don’t know what the curtains are hiding and the clerks won’t open them.





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That would be a loong class. It takes years to acquire that kind of knowledge. That knowledge comes from experience: seeing, touching, comparing, listening…
A complete two-volume set could be written on the topic of how to derermine originality but without hands-on experience a lot would be lacking.





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I am looking forward to having that gun in hand. Fits exactly what I was looking for in a Trojan 16.

Dean, I am glad to find out that you got it. Let us know how nice it is when you get it in your hands.

Albright's is a reputable seller I've dealt with before. That gun is in exceptional condition for a relatively early (faux doll's head) Trojan. Nice find.

For the right buyer, that gun could sell for twice the price.

That is about a 1922 Trojan and it wasn’t many serial numbers after it that the Trojan rib extension was eliminated as a cost-saving measure. I had a Trojan 16 no. 202066 that has the extension which may have been the last.





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Dean, I have a 16 gauge Trojan, serial number 204716, with an extended rib. A little bit later than yours.

Thank you, that’s good to know!
How long are your barrels David?





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My 20 ga Trojan has. no rib extension.

My 20ga Trojan does.

Good for you Daryl

Dean, my 16 gauge Trojan has a 28 inch barrel and is choked IC/Mod.
David Rose

Unfortunately, I think you missed expense in your list. Getting burned a time or two will learn you some things.

I would say that getting burned, a result of miscalculated value, is the result of a lack of experience in the things I listed.





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Dean, we were at the Parker annual meeting in Binghamton 4-5 years back and the vote for "best of show" was happening. I saw 2-3 that I thought were amazing. You saw one that to me was rather normal and you said, "That's an all original untouched Parker that's what you want to see." I just saw a Parker. I asked how you knew and you said, "It takes years of touching and feeling to know and learn." That's all well and good but without someone at your side you can ASSUME you're assessing originality when in fact you're learning all the wrong stuff. If you had you picked up that gun and laid it side by side with another I thought was perfect and showed me how you knew the bluing was off, how the finish was not original, how you knew the case color had been done wrong, how the checkering was not correct I could have shaved a year off the curve. That, Dean, is invaluable so I would argue that if you have that knowledge you share it face to face rather than saying, "You gotta look at a lot of guns." I'm not naive to think you don't also have to study guides and TPS, of course you do. It's like shooting a clay target and missing it 50 times and then an instructor walks up and says, "No, you shoot that as a crosser, not a dropper" and the light bulb goes off. Hands on instruction is how physicians, craftsmen and others learn quicker at the beginning of the curve. Nobody has ever said, "Go pound a lot of nails, that's how you become a better carpenter." Somebody shows them. This organization is getting older and if people don't hand off this knowledge face to face it may die for these guns. Maybe I'm a slow learner but I don't think so. And I will take to the bank my feeling that there are a lot of "original" Parkers out there that are very much touched and the owners then wonder why they don't get the price they want back out of them. I became a fan of this group because of Don Mills. He reached out to me and offered some assistance on this forum and asked me to call him. He gave me one or two pointers about buying a Parker, small stuff that stuck. You gotta pay it forward.