I picked the new letters up at the post office yesterday and upon opening the envelope this morning noticed one has been corrected but the other is identical to the first.
Again I have sent off a query because I believe the dates are correct and would like to confirm my suspicions. This is what I believe and I may be way off or I may be bang on?!
The Cody letter dates would certainly explain a few discrepancies from the accepted norms of production based on model change periods such as the lack of cocking indicators which would normally be present on an NID made in 1928 from research I've found online and later discontinued. The addition of the Sunburst recoil pad which didn't appear until 1932 may also be telling but it may have also been added many years later as it is in very good soft condition and I'd expect a pad of that age if original to be hard as rock as is the case with my '57 and '63 Knick SBT's with original Sunburst pads. In fact the pad on '63 being a gun that has seen alot of use the past 5 years is starting to shows signs of eventual failure and I'm having a biotch of a time locating an original Sunburst pad that has the aluminum spacer and not the black plastic spacer but I digress. Back to the topic at hand.
The two sets of barrels have the original numbered choke marks on the barrel flats common to Ithaca and neither would indicate a skeet designation but there is an extra choke designation stamped on the underside of both sets of barrels forward of the flats. One set is designated SKEET/SKEET as the Cody letter suggests and the other is stamped 50% and 65%. The 50%/65% stamped barrels are stamped 2/4 on the flats which is typical and what one would expect to see. The 50% definitely aligns with the #2(Mod) designation as does the 65% with the #4(Full) as I recall reading and being told over the phone by a tech at Briley a pattern of 65% plus is considered a full choke pattern as the # 4 Ithaca choke designation for full would indicate.
Back to the barrels stamped skeet. Skeet as we know it today was not actually named skeet until 1926 when the inventor put an ad in a magazine to rename the modified game of "round the clock" it had been called prior to eliminating the top half of the clock and adding two stations. Skeet became the new chosen name. The official game of skeet came into play in 1928 when the National Skeet Shooting Association was formed and I may be wrong but I have not seen any guns personally stamped "skeet" on the barrels or receivers prior to the 1930's? Even Winchester did not stamp their WS1 and WS2 choke and Skeet Grade designations on their guns until 1933.
This leads me to believe the second set of choke designations on the barrels of the NID were added after the gun was ordered and completed in 1938. Their does not seem to be any indication other than the strange markings that the barrels were modified in any way after they left the factory. The specs correspond to the records letter from Cody with both barrels being ordered as a matched length set and one set being skeet.
Another fascinating tidbit to me is comparing this gun to my 1927 4E NID factory ordered two bbl set 12ga is that the 16ga has one forend that fits both barrel sets where my 12ga each set of barrels has it's own forend.
I would like to know also what is meant by "Extra for block job stock" as indicated on the Cody records letter? Anyone?
I wonder? Was this gun was started in 1928 having all the serial #'s stamped on all the parts being built as a "high grades for knick" then for whatever reason the order was cancelled(start of the Great Depression perhaps?) and all parts got shelved and not completed until years later when an order was placed for a 16ga.with an extra set of barrels and the order was completed and shipped to the buyer a decade later?
I wondered too how it came to be in Canada and the Cody letter cleared that up with the Ithaca records showing the gun was shipped to a Lion Sporting Goods in Toronto in 1938. A quick google search showed they opened in 1927 and closed in 1993. Not all that long ago really so maybe some research and queries will find someone who may have records from the store. Maybe the gun was owned by the stores original owner?
So as you can see there is many more questions than answers when you decide to get a Cody records letter!
I'd forgotten just how pretty this gun was as I haven't looked at it for a couple months.
WHOA that is amazing you have access to that! Thank you for sharing that!!