Wood smokeless powder was invented in 1876. For years our ammunition companies offered all brass and paper NPEs and shooters loaded their own shotgun shells or small local firms, sporting goods and hardware stores, hand loaded shells for them. Chamberlin Cartridge Co. was one of the first offering machine loaded shells in the mid-1880s. In their 1886-7 catalog they offered smokeless powder loads, highlighted in red --
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In 1890, Capt. A.W. Money and his family moved to the U.S. from England and opened the American E.C. & Schultze Powder Company in Oakland Park, Bergen County, New Jersey with offices in NYC, making smokeless powders.
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The big companies began offering factory loaded shells by the early 1890s. Union Metallic Cartridge Co. was offering smokeless powder shells in 1891. Winchester offered smokeless powder shotgun shells to selected shooters in 1893 and to the general public in 1894. When Remington Arms Co. introduced their Remington Hammerless Double in 1894, their catalogs state their shotguns were adapted to all nitro powders.
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