doublegunshop.com - home Forums Thread Like Summary - Arrieta and Morton’s Limited of Lexington, KY

Can anyone share info on Arrieta guns and Morton’s Limited of Lexington, KY? I am assuming an importer but can’t find the years these guns were imported by them and the model(s) they imported. I have a 16 ga sidelock gun w/double triggers, disc strikers, ejectors, 26” barrels and Briley thin wall choke tubes. I did see a few on line with the Briley thin walls so assuming this was something that was optional by the importer. Thanks - doublenut

Morton's LTD was John Morton, an importer who did it on the side & worked out of an ice distributing company in Lexington (no store front for Morton's LTD as far as I know). I bought an Arrieta 801 through him in the late 80's.

He was importing Arrieta guns from the mid 80's to early/mid 90's. He had some connection w/ the old Dunn's sporting goods/dog supply mail order & store in Grand Junction TN & was selling some Arrieta's through them. When Dunn's went under so did he.

John Allen was Dunn's and should be able to give you information. "Firearms Appraisal Services" is his name on the internet.

Top picture shows I*2 = 1989. Interesting 1000 bar proof, 14,500 psi.

Bruce

850 would be standard proof. 1000 is midway between standard and full heavy 1200 bar proof. I’ve seen it before on Spanish guns. Nothing the matter with your gun proof at all. Just a not often seen proof level.

John:

Dunn’s bought the name. Paul was very well known and Dietrich less so.

I only know this because I used to shop at Jaeger’s regularly before Dunn’s bought them. They were less than ten miles from my home at the time. I still have a 20 gauge Bernardelli Gamecock and a Bushnell spotting scope I bought from them before the business was sold.

Rem

Generally speaking you can tell the model by the engraving, but not always. Arrieta had standard engraving patterns for each of their models, but being a custom maker, they'd build whatever the customer ordered. I've seen 500 series (5-pin) guns engraved in the 931-style (7-pin) of engraving. In fact, I believe one is shown on the dust jacket cover of Spanish Best and shown with several pics in the book. The author Terry Wieland was careful in how he described this particular gun, saying it was engraved in the 931-style, not that it is an Arrieta 931. Spanish Best does not show all the standard models and their engraving patterns at the time the book was written, brochures of the day when your gun was built will be your best bet in determining the model.

There was a time you could e-mail your gun's serial number to Arrieta and they would tell you the model. Since Arrieta went out of business in ~2014, I don't know if there's someone or somewhere else where you can obtain info on your gun. Why not post a few pics here or on shotgunworld.com's Spanish Shotguns forum of your Arrieta's engraving to see if anyone can help.