Family Tradition (the 760 Meatpole)

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Anything to do with 1968 and ending a dream?

Winner winner. The 760 was used by James Earl Ray to assassinate MLK in '68. It also led Congress to enact the 1968 Gun Control Act

[Mocha1545]

 

Dad semi-retired it in '75 but after trying a Weatherby 7mm and a Rem 7600, only to go back to the ol Meatpole in the last years he hunted. It was handed down to me 15 years ago.

Here's a shout out to pops, a WWII vet and my personal hero. He turns 90 in a couple weeks.

He taught me how to hunt, appreciate nature and sit quiet.

 

Great choice for a Hero. They don't make me like that anymore! America's greatest generation!

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So I spent the morning doing some research into this heirloom and its components and here's what I learned:

 

This rifle was manufactured in March 1952, years earlier than I had thought making it 65 years old next month. The date codes are plainly visible on the barrel.

 

The Weaver V4.5 scope was manufactured in El Paso, TX sometime shortly after Weaver first introduced the variable power rifle scope in 1950.

 

These scopes are 7/8" steel tube and Weaver did all the glass coating, polishing and tube bluing in house. Thousands of the scopes were sent to Korea for sniper use. There are no serial numbers or manufacture dates on the scopes.

 

One thing that makes this particular scope a little more rare is it's post and wire reticle resembling the Zeiss II German style.

Is the glass still clear and hold on Zero? It's glass is remarkabley clear, never fogs and the turret caps haven't been off for adjustment in memory.

 

The early 740s were not predrilled for scopes. One way around this was the Stith drilless scope mounts.

 

Stith CO had been around since the early 1900s teaming up with optic manufacturers to provide adjustable mounts for scope tubes, since in the beginning stages of glass optics the windage and elevation adjustments were made in the mount and not in the scope. These mounts were machined in the basement of an accounting firm in downtown San Antonio TX.

 

The mounts had to be ordered for your specific scope and weapon.

These mounts were selling for about $27 a set in 1952 as was the Weaver variable scope (combined, nearly $500 in today's currency). By adding the scope and mounts to your 760, you would have easily doubled the original cost of your Remington pump rifle. That was big bucks 65 years ago when the annual medium income was about $1500.

Stith was acquired by Redfield in 1956.

 

Hard to imagine but originally the entire mount was blued.