Ithaca Hawken plains rifle

[vunderbar]

Hello there! I was looking through the forums and there was a thread about an Ithaca Hawken Rifle. I also have one, but the thread seemed a little vague on the value. Its really clean and was a kit, near as I can tell. Any idea what its worth?

[coyotejoe]

The "Blue Book of Modern Black Powder Arms" lists it at $400 if in 100% condition. But really, a thing is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it, which depends on how bad they want it,  how much they have, and what the seller is willing to accept. In their day they sold for considerably more than a T/C Hawken and were considered to be much more like a real Hawken rifle, whereas the T/C bears little resemblance.

[vunderbar]

Well, thank you very much! I was hoping somebody would get back to me on this.

[vunderbar]

So, somebody selling it for 850 at a gun show somewhere back east may have been full of crap? Is there a collector spin on this gun?

[coyotejoe]

Collecting factory built muzzleloaders is not a big area of interest but there is some collector value. Mainly people want to shoot them. In their day they were considered to be a more accurate likeness of an original Hawken and were pretty good shooters. They have been off the market for 30 years of so and there never were lots of them so they have held their value much better than other replica guns.

[wwpete52]

So, somebody selling it for 850 at a gun show somewhere back east may have been full of crap? Is there a collector spin on this gun?

The Ithaca Hawken was a great rifle.  They were originally made by Cherry Corners many years ago.  Ithaca purchased the inventory and began selling it as the Ithaca Hawken.  Navy Arms stepped in the picture and partnered with Ithaca for awhile.  All of these were great rifles.  I bet the one that you saw for $850 was one of those.  In the early years they were basically custom guns. 
After a time Navy Arms took over the project.  After the made in USA parts were used up Navy had them built by Uberti in Italy.  They were still fine rifles however.  Uberti did, and still does, a good job of building firearms. 
The Ithaca Hawken was a rather expensive rifle in it's day.  If my memory serves me correct  you could buy two T/C Hawkens for the price of one Ithaca Hawken.
By the way, it was said to be an exact copy of the Hawken owned by Kit Carson.

So the book says that an Ithaca Hawken in 100% is worth $400.  Well, I tell you that you cannot find a new rifle of that quailty anywhere near $400!

Now if I have any of the facts wrong please correct me.  My memory is not what it use to be.  In fact someone told me there are two things that go first when you get older.  One is the memory. I can't remember what the other one is.