By Patrick E. Hallam
104 pages, $40.00
Reviewed by Peter A. Alexander
I wish I had received this book before I had finished the editing of my book last year. I am certainly happy to have a copy now, since it has changed my whole approach to designing a longrifle.
As readers may remember, I have referred to “The Golden Mean Proportion in Baroque and Firearms Design: An Art-Historical Approach,” that fine article in volume two of The Journal of Historical Armsmaking Technology by Barry C. Bohnet. While I was focusing on the decoration, Patrick Hallam, also influenced by Bohnet, took a different path: he wanted to find out whether the original gunsmiths used the Golden Mean proportion to design the gunstock itself, along with its attendant mounts, patchbox and inlays. His research proves that they did.
The Golden Mean Proportion, as discovered by the ancient Greeks, very probably by Pythagoras, is the underlying proportion of the natural world. Basically, it is the natural relationship of dimensions, expressed mathematically as 1:1.618. What this means is that for any unit of one dimension (for example, length) the related dimension (for example, width) will be 1.618. However these basic measurements are too small to be useful, so one multiplies the relationship by 3, arriving at a more employable relationship of 3:5.
I first met Patrick last summer at Dixon’s Gunmakers’ Fair following my seminar on the decoration of the longrifle. Using a set of proportional dividers, which makes it easy to determine the Golden Mean, he quickly took me through the process whereby some gunsmiths laid out their stocks. I found it difficult to follow his explanation in such a crowd and in such a hurry, but I encouraged him to publish his research.
He asked me if I thought all of the rifles in George Shumway’s book, George Schreyer Sr. & Jr., Gunmakers of Hanover, York County, Pennsylvania were in fact made by Schreyer. When I asked why, he told me that he had discovered at least three different processes of applying the Golden Mean to the guns in the book. It would only be logical, he pointed out, that Schreyer, and indeed any original gunsmith, would follow one process. I agreed to send him a list of the guns that I doubted were made by Schreyer.
At home, I sent him the list, made a set of dividers and started fumbling with them. Then in February of this year, a copy of this book arrived. Well and clearly written and illustrated, it takes a number of readings to grasp, understand, assimilate and, more importantly, use Hallam’s excellent research.
The author very clearly leads the reader. The first two chapters present not only a historical background, but Hallam’s efforts to understand how the Golden Mean proportion was a pragmatic and easy technique used by original gunsmiths to design their guns. Chapter 3 lists the tools and instructs one in how to use them. As he points out, you can buy a set of dividers or make them. I am cheap, so I made two sets, out of 1/8" X 1/2" steel. Chapter 4 gets the reader into the practical aspects of applying the dividers and should not be rushed or skimmed. If you are a gunstocker and have had problems determining such essential elements as the length of the comb, cheek-piece terminations and height of the wrist, this chapter presents easy and quick processes for doing so, using just the dividers.
I do object somewhat to the idea of using the Golden Mean to determine the ramrod entry. I consider this the balance point of the rifle, and that depends mainly on the barrel. Admittedly, however, I have examined original rifles where the balance point does not apply, most notably several rifles by John Armstrong.
Chapter 5 shows how some famous original gunsmiths used the Golden Mean proportion to design their guns. Accurate line drawings of guns by Adam Angstadt, Jacob Stoudenouer, Nathaniel Vogler, Martin Sheetz, Frederick Sell, George Schreyer, John Armstrong and John Philip Beck, among others, are presented, all taken from the Kentucky Rifle Association’s The Kentucky Rifle: A True American Heritage in Picture (with permission). The KRA book has very sharp and clear photographs of original rifles. By presenting guns from different areas of rifle making, Hallam proves that the Golden Mean as a technique for designing the gun was commonly understood and used, albeit with different processes.
Fortunately, I have full-size blow-ups of some rifles by Beck and Armstrong so I was able to check and confirm the author’s research. This is a particularly valuable chapter for any contemporary gunsmith who wishes to re-create the work of an original gunsmith. So, for example, if you want to make a Beck, there is a wood patchbox Beck on pages 96–97 and a brass patch box Beck on pages 98–101 (from The Kentucky Rifle 12, 13). And it really doesn’t matter what trigger reach distance you use: the proportional dividers, following the process or steps that the author describes, will produce an historically accurate Beck.
The author even presents an intriguing determination of religious symbolism in Beck’s brass patch box. Having led the reader through the basics, Hallam encourages the reader to discover the processes and refinements on other original rifles and apply them or develop his own in his own work. I am already doing so.
Do I have any quibbles? One or two. For example, the author suggests that the original gunsmiths might have cast different sized butt plates as required by the Golden Mean proportion in terms of a particular trigger reach distance. I have no evidence to agree with this. I believe those gunsmiths cast their mounts from standard patterns. Certainly, all of the rifles that I have examined by a particular gunsmith have the same size butt plates. On the other hand, the difference in butt plate height, depending on a trigger reach distance varying between twelve and fourteen inches would be minimal, and perhaps my measurements have not been perfectly accurate. As Patrick said to me, “I have only shown what I have found.”
All in all, this is a terrific book, essential to the contemporary gunsmith. As friend Bill Reynolds, a fine gunsmith living in Marietta, Ohio, recently said, “No wonder the Kentucky rifle looks so natural!”
@ 2007 ScurlockPublishing Co., Inc. All rights reserved.