Sucks to be poor

[Bob beach]

Angel,

If you had been around between 1920 and 1922 you could have bought this same Parker at Von Lengerke & Detmold (#173979) as a used gun for $275. It was sold three times during that period. The sale recorded in the photo below shows that it was sold as a consigned shotgun in 1921. It came in from J.A. Sloan who wanted to net $225 from the sale. The parker was sold to Gus Diderrich who was a chef for Alice Vanderbilt and, later, for Peter A.B. Widener, a very wealthy Philadelphian. Gus Didderich was one of the most frequent buyers of very high end firearms (Purdey, Boss, H&H, Parker, etc) between 1910 and 1930. He must have been a darn good cook. But to keep things in perspective, $275 would likely have bought you a new Ford at that time.



Compliments of Griffin & Howe

Bob Beach
Records Archivist

[Angel Cruz Ortiz]

Bob, thanks for that bit of history, that's real neat. I'm only 89 years too late.

[Bill Murphy]

Mr. Beach, was that the Sloan from Sloan's Sporting Goods up the street? I take it that maybe Sloan's didn't deal in used guns? Sloan's sold some wonderful new guns but I don't know about the used ones. I once lettered a Parker gun from Sloan's that was sold to Annie Laurie Crawford, a serious shooter who once inherited something like 31 large, only one of her sources of income. Bill Murphy

[Mike Murphy]

That gun was obviously ruined by some unthinking boob replacing the stock.
(Let's call that a small jab at the "purists" amongst us.)

[Bill Murphy]

I agree with the previous poster that some modifications of original guns don't seem to affect the value. However, Mr. M., try to sell a restocked VHE or DHE for the big buck. It all depends on the individual gun. We don't object to your jab. It is a good comment on our hobby. I have a clue that this Murphy fellow may be "one of us". Time will tell.

[Mike Murphy]

Bill,
I'm probably the guy who would buy that restocked VHE if it was restocked with a nice piece of walnut with a 2 1/4" DAH and 1/4 cast off, instead of the beat up stock with the 3" drop that it probably had. Only point I'm making is that sometimes a refurbishment or rebuild is the best thing a particular shotgun can have happen to it.
I also appreciate quality firearms that have been reasonably cared for and show their "history" and life story in their patina and scars. I've got both and i wouldn't necessarily want to be refurbished.

[Dean Romig]

It is indeed a fine and beautiful Parker and to some, the replacement stock (looks to me like Del Grego's stockwork) wouldn't be a problem but to others would be a 'deal breaker'.
The eventual sell price (which would allow for the price of a restock by a contemporary artist in the field) would be the determining factor to the gun ever ending up in certain collector's safes...

[Fishtail]

It seems an awful lot of high end Parkers on the market have been restocked, from this gun to the Czar's gun.

At $30K, if the gun were still wearing its original wood, I'd be having a sit down talk with my wife. The kind where we openly talk about our feelings. Like, "I feel like buying another Parker - go get the big checkbook." With the restock, to a PG no less, I won't.

[winplumber]

I did just that last night ! You know what I was told, NO GUN IS WORTH 30K. Oh well

[Ed Blake]

Originally Posted by Steve Huffman

I did just that last night ! You know what I was told, NO GUN IS WORTH 30K. Oh well

I tend to agree with her.