Red 20 Ga. Hulls

[Researcher]

A Navy Chief I shot with in San Diego had a case of them and gave me two boxes. In December 1973 I safely stored them away at my parents' house in Seattle on my way to Alaska. Next time I saw them they were fifty empties on the loading bench. Dear old Dad had shot doves with them!! I have one Western factory load and one Winchester reloaded in my shell collection. I'd imagine a crisp, full, factory fresh box would have some collector value.

[Cold Spring]

A full box of red paper 20's that pre-date Billy's shells and Dave's vignette. Would look good in a shell collection or with a Model 12 or 21 Skeet gun.
.

[Phil Yearout]

No 20’s but I remember when 16’s were red or green, not purple. I still have a few boxes of my dad’s that I’ll never shoot: red Winchester Rangers and green Remington Express. I always liked the green ones and making that the standard 16 color makes just as much sense as purple, which is one of my least favorite colors 🤨!

[Researcher]

Maybe I've led a sheltered life, but I've only seen purple Federal 16-gauge shells both paper and plastic.

My Remington 16-gauge shells are green, right through the most recent box of Remington Express I've been carrying in the left barrel for Pheasants. Of course, the 16-gauge Remington plastic Game Loads are black.

My large stash of compression formed 16-gauge Winchester and Western hulls I reload are all red.

[10 bore]

here are 3 different colored 16 ga paper shells, the middle one is a slug

[Phil Yearout]

I guess I was under the impression that purple was the given color for 16ga shells like yellow is for 20's. I admit it's been a while since I've bought any so some may have changed. Just looked through my stash...

Federal - purple
Herters - purple
RST- purple (have had some red ones)
Winchester - red (most of these are quite a few years old)
Rio - red
Fiocchi - blue
Remy Game Load - black
Remy Express - green (Walmart sticker at $5.99 a box, so...)

But I still think they all oughta be green!

[Researcher]

Here is my accumulation of loose 16-gauge shells --

16-gauge shells.jpg

Upper left Federal - red paper, purple paper & purple plastic.

Upper right Remington -- 2 Nitro Club, Remington Express paper & plastic, Shur-Shot, two different plastic Game Load head-stamped Remington Peters.
Lower left - Western Xpert & variety of Super-X.

Lower middle - WW Dove & Quail.

Lower right - Peters Victor and U.S. Cartridge Co. Climax.

Surprised I don't have any loose Winchester 16-gauge shells.