Guns Made for HD Folsom

[Bindlestiff]

I did a little research on long barreled Parkers, I was wondering what the longest barrel length was. From what I found, it looks to be 40 inches. I found that there were 46 Parke's sold with 40 inch barrels. There were a few entries bigger than 40 inches in the Ser & ID book but I think they were entered in error.

The first thing I noticed was that some of these guns were made in consecutive serial numbers, which posed the question, “Were they special order guns?”

I noted that there are three groups of 12 gauge guns serial numbers 47641 – 47645, 53623 – 53627 and 80371 – 80375 as well as a 10 gauge group numbered 135632 – 135634.

So, I asked Mark Conrad if he could look at some of the sequential serial numbered guns for me and tell me if they were simply a production run of long barreled guns or a special order. As usual, it didn’t take long for Mark to reply.

I learned that all the 12 gauge guns were ordered by H. D. Folsom in New York City. In the first order (47641 – 47645), there were five 12 gauge at 40 inches, twenty 12 gauge at 38 inches, seven 12 gauge at 36 inches and five 12 gauge at 34 inches; all what I regard as long barrels. The stocks on the 40 inch guns were to have a length of 14 ¼ to 14 ½ inches and a drop of 3 to 3 ½ inches. And they all were to have trap butt plates.
H. D Folsom’s second order (53623 – 53627) was about the same, with four 12 gauge at 40 inches, two 12 gauge at 38 inches etc. Again, they were all to have trap butt plates.

Their third order (80371 – 80375) had five 12 gauge at 40 inches and ten 12 gauge at 38 inches but no mention of the trap butt plates.

The 40 inch, 10 gauge order (135632 – 135634) was made by the American Trading Co. in NY back in 1905.

I have only seen one loooooong barreled Parker and I think it was "only" 38 inches. Assuming 46+ guns were made with 40 inch barrels and none seem to ever come to light; I wounder why?

And, what was their intended use. I can imagine one made here and there for an individual but it seems odd that they would be made in production runs like this.

Has anyone handled a 40 inch Parker?

[Mark Conrad]

There may be a few more out there than what is listed in TPS. Stock books 13,18, and 20 are missing. The Serialization book does not have the grades 0, 1 and 2 where the stock books are missing. It does have the grade 3 or higher. Most of these guns were in the lower grades.

I suspect these guns were the early trap guns and were being used at the traps in NYC which is where they were all going. They had more drop than the latter trap guns but the higher stocks came 5 to 10 years latter. Guns with less that 2 1/2 inches of drop in this time period are hard to find.

Mark