No More Winchester Model 70s and 94s

[Gil Martin]

My local gun shop received a communication from U.S. Repeating Arms that effective the end of March 2006, they will cease production of Model 70s, 94s and 1300s. This is an active topic on another Board and it is accurate. All the best...
Gil

[Gil Martin]

End of an era as Winchester rifle plant prepares to close
By Matt Apuzzo, Associated Press Writer | January 17, 2006

NEW HAVEN, Conn. --U.S. Repeating Arms Co. Inc. said Tuesday it will close its Winchester firearm factory, threatening the future of a rifle that was once called "The Gun that Won the West."

Article Tools
Printer friendly
E-mail to a friend
Conn. RSS feed
Available RSS feeds
Most e-mailed
More:
Globe City/Region stories |
Latest local news |
Globe front page |
Boston.com
Sign up for: Globe Headlines e-mail | Breaking News Alerts "It's part of who we are as a nation just like it's part of who we are as a city," Mayor John DeStefano said.

The announcement touched off a lobbying effort by city officials and union leaders who hoped to find a buyer for the plant before it closes March 31. If no buyer comes forward, it could spell the end for nearly all commercially produced Winchesters, said Everett Corey, a representative of the International Association of Machinists District 26.

"Winchester would be pretty much defunct," he said. "They're not going to produce them, other than a couple custom-type models."

The company has been plagued by slumping firearm sales. More than 19,000 people worked there during World War II, but the plant employs fewer than 200 now. All will lose their jobs when the plant closes.

The Winchester model 1873 lever action rifle was popular among American frontiersmen at the end of the 19th century for its reliability. John Wayne made the Winchester rifle a signature of his movies and Chuck Connors posed menacingly with his Winchester on the poster for the television series "The Rifleman."

"Marlin made lever-action rifles but nobody ever had a Marlin in films or TV series. They were always Winchesters," said Ned Schwing, a firearms historian.

Perhaps the company's greatest unofficial spokesman was President Teddy Roosevelt, who used the 1895 model on his famous 1909 African safari, which historians credited with boosting the sale of Winchester sporting rifles.

Since the plant opened in 1866, tens of millions of Winchester rifles have been produced, the bulk of which came between the late 1800s and the end of World War II, said firearms historian R.L. Wilson, who has written books about Winchester. More than six million copies of the Winchester Model 94, the company's most popular rifle, have been produced.

"Several generations have worked at this place, a lot of fathers and brothers, sons, uncles and daughters," said Paul DeMennato, facility director at U.S. Repeating Arms.

U.S. Repeating Arms, which is owned by the Herstal Group, a Belgium company, has said for years that it was on the brink of closing the plant.

DeMennato said the company is negotiating the plant's sale. Missouri-based Olin Corp. owns the Winchester brand name. In the late 1970s, after a massive strike by its machinists, Olin sold the plant to U.S. Repeating Arms along with the right to use the Winchester name until next year.

Olin had no immediate word on its plans for the Winchester name. DeMennato said he hopes the name will be sold along with the plant. Nobody at Herstal's headquarters in Belgium could be reached Tuesday afternoon.

[model 70]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

looks like i'll have to make a move on that model 94 trapper sooner than later.

[Dan Morris]

Dang, guess all my pre 64 stuff is gonna go up in value! Still, I hate to see em go down!
Dan

[razmuz]

Read in the paper today about Winchester going by by. Called all over Dallas & Ft Worth and couldn't find a Feather weight 6.5X55. Finally located one for $609.00. I'll probably just leave it in the box for awhile. DID I DO GOOD??

[Adam Helmer]

Gil,

Very good post. I own Winchesters in the following models: P-17, 94 and 1300. Winchester has been on the "slippery slope of decline" for a while and hence we had the U. S. Repeating Arms Company step in for a time that seems now to have passed.

With the decline in PA deer, I doubt any young hunter will miss the demise of the Winchester name on a gun he never has a deer to shoot at. It is only the old folks who will have a sense of loss. What a shame.

Adam

[M.T. Pockets]

Sad to see them struggling. I haven't researched this at all, how is Browning doing ? Are they structured seperately under U.S. Repeating Arms ?

Really, it's surprising they survived the 70's & 80's when the quality of their line up wasn't as good as today.

I think Winchester's quality has improved quite a bit in the last decade, the model 70 is as good of a buy as any rifle in it's price range, and so is the Super XII shotgun.

[Bill Poole]

YES Razmuz you did VERY GOOD!!!

$609 is a fair price and 6.5x55 is a great caliber and featherweight a nice looking gun.

I too am very tempted to get one (there are at least 2 in phoenix i've seen yesterday and today) but I've already got one of the older push-feed types.

Poole
http://arizona.rifleshooting.com/

[razmuz]

I had my son pick up the Feather weight and was a little put off by the very dark stock. Most I'd seen had light stocks, sorta like "blond" in color. Oh well, I'm glad I got it. I do see that I'm gonna replace the extractor with a Williams all steel one.
The lady at Winchester said they were only closing the Conn. plant that made the 70, 94 & 1300.

[Downwindtracker2]

Gun store gossip,from the Browning rep,there will be a year delay before they ship again.

Herstal owns FN,Browning, and USRAC. I don't know the tie-in to Miruko. Miruko makes Browning rifles .

Olin,a big chemical company, owns the Winchester name,USRAC had the use of it until 2006 .

[skeet]

Wnchester is a name owned by Olin as previously noted... USRAC has been losing money for the last 12 yrs. The parent company Giat is an employee owned company and couldn't take the losses year after year. The Union at Winchester was not willing to make the concessions to keep the company in business. The 94's 70's and 1300 shotguns are going to be a thing of the past I guess. Closing of the plant is scheduled to be March 31 ...but don't be surprised to see it closed this week(would you want a gun made between now and March 31?) The SX-II is made in Europe and the Win O/U's are made in Japan at Miroku so they will probably stay in the pipeline at least for a while. Have also heard that they cannot make the Winchester guns here in the US for 2 yrs because of an agreement with the company and unions or some such rot. Got this info Friday from a fairly large wholesale supply place who had an inventory of approx 1 million bucks go out the door in 3 days. This was the same inventory that would have taken a year to sell in normal times. BTW that inventory figure is at distributor costs..not retail. so it really is more guns than you think and consisted of only 94's and 70's. He also has contracted (last October)for almost 500 guns that were supposed to be delivered but he doubts he will see more than half.

[M.T. Pockets]

I can't help think this will be a real kick in the pants for the new Winchester Short Mag rounds. The .300 WSM maybe has enough foothold to survive, but I wouldn't bet on the others surviving.

If the model 70 is discontinued there goes the #1 rifle chambered for these rounds.