In the Darne workshop, was a Cincinnati built die press, that had but one task-stamping the “Darne” name into the opening lever of Darne guns. There were two dies one that read “Halifax” for that model gun, and one that read “Darne” for everything else:


[Linked Image from i.ibb.co]

Sometime after the Second World War, the die for the Darne name became unusable. For a period of time, the Darne guns were built with the levers engraved with the Darne name, like so:


[Linked Image from i.ibb.co]

It would be truly useful to know the exact dates of the guns that had the name engraved on the lever, but, I don’t have that info. A good guess is that when Stoeger began importing the guns, say, 1964 or so, the company saw fit to fix the American built press that stamped the name into the gun. I’ve never seen a Stoeger marked gun with the engraved version of the lever. I am pretty sure there was never an issue with the die for the Halifax name, but, that model came and went with the economic conditions of the era. High cotton, so to speak, meant no Halifax.

Best,
Ted