An Old Rifle's Story
I am an old muzzle-loading rifle. The workmanship in me is fine even if I do say so myself. I hang on the wall with other rifles made long ago by small village gunsmiths just like the one who made me. I was not intended to be a decoration. Through all of my early years I was carried into some forests where man’s foot had never stepped, then along lakes which yet had no names. At that time not only deer and bear were in this ancient woodland but moose and panthers roamed the valleys and mountains. In the hands of several hunters through the years I did my share to help furnish food for the tables of area families, protect livestock from predators and even show myself at rifle matches. My history has borne me from the mid-19th century through the 20th and on into the 21st. I was made by a small gunsmith named Wyllys Avery in his shop in Salisbury, NY. That village is in the foothills of the Adirondack Mountains and at the very gateway to vast forest areas. My maker did put his name...