Marlin 336, 100 year anniversary model

[trooper joe]

Just traded for this 1970 Marlin 336, 100 year anniversary model.






Did not know what the medallion in the stock was until I got it home. My thoughts were to just make a project gun out if it. After it was home, I found out about these 1970 anniversary models.






Will be replacing this with a repo from Jack First since a prior owner mounted a sling swivel through the one on the stock. I will remove the front sling mount also (it is on the mag tube at present).



Maybe I will just mount the finished project on my fireplace mantel.



I have a little play in the forearm stock which has probably shrunk slightly in the last 55 years.

With my Marlin collection, I did not really have a pistol grip 336. This will fill that void.

Any information about those anniversary models would be appreciated.

Trooper Joe

[jeepnik]

I had heard of Centennial models but never seen one. I stopped at a gun shop that I frequented and found this on the used gun rack. The price was quite low for a commemorative model. I didn't hesitate.

I took it to the counter and started the paperwork. Apparently the clerk had no understanding of serial numbers. Never even remarked on it being a Centennial edition.



I had initially spotted it because it has everything I like in a levergun. Straight grip, octagon barrel and a very pretty deep bluing.

[Molasses]

This reminds of of another episode in my ongoing series of run ins with guns that could just about make you cry...

Some years back, the classified section of another forum had a listing for a Marlin Centennial Matched Pair. These were sets of both a Model 336 and Model 39, factory engraved by one or the other of two engravers who were brought in for the project, given a special serial number indicating which set they were out of the run of 1,000 pairs and included a bunch of paperwork proclaiming what and how special they were supposed to be. And a fancy luggage style carrying/display case. Which last, some of the people on this other forum blamed for the situation, saying rust from leaving the guns in that case was a known issue, but further correspondence with the seller indicated that they had been recovered from what had been his uncle's beachfront place that was wrecked in superstorm Sandy and that the case literally fell apart when pulled out of a bedroom closet, which suggests that a soaking is at least as likely to be the culprit. Although, on the other hand, the paperwork didn't have evidence of having been soaked, so it's a bit of a mystery, but in the end it doesn't really matter how things got to this point.
Anyways, as they say, "Without provenance, buy the gun, not the story" and leaves the stage set for our little tragedy:

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Got the pair for $800, plus an exorbitant amount his New York FFL wanted for shipping, but still came in appreciably under a grand. The levers in particular are best described as having been chewed up by rust, but the bores and internals were pristine. My thinking was that at the time, for that money, you couldn't get a beat up JM 336 and 39 in standard dress, so why not grab these and actually use them?

[marlinman93]

Cases did indeed cause the metal to rust on the engraved cased sets! And not because they went through any hurricane! I had a friend who bought a set new back then, and after they sat in the case in a closet for a year or two he opened the case to show a friend and the bluing had not just failed, it had bubbled in numerous places! He sent them back to Marlin and had them refinished, but not knowing the lining caused the issues he put them back in the case again! A year later I was visiting and he wanted to show me his restored pair, but when he opened the case they had rusted and bubbled again! He almost cried when he saw yet more damage the same as before!
He didn't want to send them off again, and was going to sell them, so we agreed on a price and I brought them home. I stripped and reblued them yet again, but kept them in my safe and only put them in the case to display at our collector gun shows. They never rusted again, and eventually I sold them to another friend and told him to never leave them in the case! They still look perfect and never rusted again.

The somewhat plain (by comparison) Model 336 and 39A Centennial models never sold as well as Marlin hoped, and they had so many leftover medallions, and specific pieces leftover that they were selling them as "kits" cheap to add to any Marlin rifle. Not many kits were sold, and at one of the MFCA collectors meetings Bill Brophy had boxes full of them he put out for anyone who wanted them. I grabbed a plastic bag and loaded up with them as nobody still wanted them. I made keychains from the medallions by using the epoxy in the kits to put two back to back, and drilled a hole in them for the key chain. They sold fast as a key chain! I still have a couple complete kits I set aside as I thought they'd be unusual collectors items.

[Molasses]

It's good, for a certain definition of the word, to have verification on what I was told elsewhere. I do know that there were actually two sets in the Gun Library of the nearest Cabela's not too long after I got hold of mine and all four guns had some surface rust, but nothing like mine.