I just couldn't let this one pass. After a vigorous discussion on another thread of the merits of certain collectors' associations prohibiting the offering for sale of that which they collect on their respective websites, I notice this thread on parkergun.org at 12:30 11/6 CST:

Title: "Parker DHE--Want to Sell"

Clicking on the thread, the poster who gives his name, and is available by personal message e-mail says,

"Hello, I know I can't advertise on this sight [sic], but does anyone know where I can advertise my Parker? Signed, Name xxx."

When I clicked back here there were already three responses from the usual suspects, one even mentioning this site. Next there will be a flurry of activity, discussing whether the posting violates the rules, e-mails will be sent to webmasters who might even be gainfully employed at their day jobs, then the thread disappears into the black hole of censorship...yadda, yadda, yadda... and, once again, form triumphs over substance.

By now the guy probably has cut his deal. Business as usual! EDM

A prime example of why the PGCA rule against selling guns is so dumb in the first place.

Agreed: Along with refusing to use my real name on a public forum that's another reason I don't post there. Even the most unabashed gun grabber would probably admit that 70+ year old double shotguns hold little if any interest to the criminal element and thats the only valid reason I can think of to disallow their sale.
Jim

Contrary to popular misconception, rules are not meant to be broken but, conversely, are meant to be adhered to.
Anyone who knowingly breaks a rule for his own personal gain is of low moral character and anyone who advises others to do the same is of equally low moral character.
Wether the rules make any sense to everyone, or not, they are still (until changed) the rules - period.

Which is why- Dean, you would have my vote on the PGCA for a BOD post-if (well, you know the rest-let's let it rest)-because, amigo mio- you and I believe, as did Orwell- that "All animals are equal" not that some are "More Equal-er" than others-The Army might phrase it more harshly than did Limey author Eric Blair-but the point is the same-Good on you--wish more of the elitist world would agree- "Tricky Dick Nixon" my C-I-C during my last 4 years- lied to the American public about Laos, Cambodia, his wife's fur coat, the price of the K-Mart dog collar their cocker spaniel "Checkers" wore when he went out to crap in the Rose Garden- "Slick Willie the Draft Dodger" wouldn't have known the truth if it jumped out and bit him on his kneecap-and the "Beat Goes On"--I wish you nothing but the best in your bid for a BOD seat on the PGCA- a solid voice of reason in a sea of discord and petty squabbles (IMO)..RWTF

I think in effect guns are being bought and sold on the PGCA site all the time. At a "subliminal" level if you will. After all that is how Dean found out about his beautiful 16ga hammer gun. Someone had to come over to the PGCA site to "advertise" it. Dean didn't do anything wrong, but they should have been able to sell that gun on our site in the first place. IMO, it is absolutly rediculous that collectors of the finest American made double shotgun can't buy, trade and sell these fine doubles to fellow members. And I found out that the reason we don't sell guns on our site is we are not trusted not to pick each other's guns apart. This is simply fixed, do it in private. This does not make any sense to me. I think that the only thing keeping this old rule in place is old mindsets and it is time to revisit it. Lets take the cloak and dagger out of it and make it right for us that play by the rules.

Tim

Tim, you make good points and I can't disagree with any of them.

Dean

IMO, the official reason they don't allow guns for sale - 'legal and/or BATF' is just phooey. There are plenty of other sites that allow guys to hook up for gun sales and they don't seem to be going to jail. The other excuse - 'people can always advertise in the Parker Pages' is just as lame. In 2008 that's like using a carrier pigeon instead of email.

The real reason? I think it's to protect the all-important dealers who are part of the PGCA. I can't offer a gun for sale, but if I hang up a shingle and become a dealer then it's OK. Odd.

All I'm going to say on this subject is:
What just happened on the Parker site, happens with some regularity. You just have to be quick on the PM's if your interested in buying. If they would allow guns to be sold, it would eliminate this problem.

The humor in all of this is that I never had a gun to sell that I would have tried to peddle on the Internet. Every Parker I have ever owned I bought one-on-one face-to-face, mostly from top-rung dealers. I have never bid on or bought a gun on any Internet site, and don't even surf the net for Parkers. There is a waiting list for some of my seminal wall hangers...for when the time comes. The AAH Pigeon Gun on the cover of my new book will probably go through Jim Julia's auction, when the time comes.

I have no previous or immediate vested interest in whether the PGCA allows or disallows buy/sell postings. But as a keen observer, I see hypocrisy in a self-defeating rule that is antagonistic to the very core interest of PGCA (and LCSCA) membership goals--the networking and free exchange of topical information by and between like-minded individuals. An if anyone followed my original post to parkergun.org to see what's what, enforcement can be catch as catch can...and often silly.

Case in point: Several years ago someone posted on the PGCA site something that could be construed to be an offer to sell, if you heaped on much paranoia and anal-retentive speculation. Actually the guy was looking for an appraisal for a special type of family heirloom...so I simply posted "Call Me" and gave my number. As it was, the gun was a rare half-frame of a grade I didn't have in my photo inventory. I had heard that such a gun was in my neighborhood, and there was a Double Gun shoot in Aurora IL that very weekend. If he was attending, I wanted him to bring the gun so I could take some pictures. The guy called me to say that he was from Colorado. End of story, almost...

Pretty soon some anonymous poster got on taking high umbrage that I was "leaving him and other potential buyers behind." Then the thread got into the relative merits of whether I could post "Call Me" and my phone number. So what disappeared? Not the supposed offer to sell, but my name and phone number! I didn't notice this till some time later, because the web police seldom or never announce their censorship--threads just disappear. Maybe somebody e-mailed me; I forget. But when I e-mailed the webmaster, who is a friend, and has been in my home, he reamed me out, not for offering to buy a gun on the website, but for failing to fully state my pure intentions!

Meanwhile, the supposed offer to sell was still heading up the thread, and is probably still there today. Much ado about nothing. And when I went to Aurora Double Gun Days the local owner of the 1/2-frame was there with his gun, and I forgot to bring my camera. Ces't la vie! EDM

Mr. Muderlak referred to me as a "usual suspect" when I referred the PGCA poster to Dave Weber's site to sell his gun. Ed is following his standard operating procedure of badmouthing Mr. Murphy no matter what he says or does. I guess it doesn't matter because Ed and I are friends, but it is a bit hard to maintain that status. Honestly, I have never bought a Parker from a contact I have made on the PGCA forum. I don't have deep pockets and I find more guns to buy locally than I can pay for.

Agree with you 200% Dean. Tim is "spot on" and to show my regard for his insight and wisdom re: Parkers- Bought, Sold, Swapped, etc. I am going to ask Santa Claus to see that he gets a case of WD-40 for the coming Holidays. Thought about asking the old fat gent (Casablanca-maybe) to make that Bushmills, but don't want Tim to have his judgement affected by "A wee jolt of Irish whiskey"- by the by, lads, the Scots are known to be a frugal sort- so they save a whole letter on their labels by calling their "Highland Lavoris" whisky- just wonderin' of course!! RWTF

The even bigger jackass is the guy who recently posted pics of his cobbled up 'heirloom' Parker. He was told it was a dog of a gun, rightly so. So then he has the gall to request the moderators remove the thread so if he tries to unload it there won't be a record of the fact he was told it was a dog. Unbelievable. I assume that guy goes through life just waiting for karma to strike him down. He's probably been bit by a bus by now.

The DHE for sale has turned into a Hoot to the third power: (1) A quick check shows the "offensive" thread disappeared; chalk up a victory for censorship and the censors, who ever they may be. (2) Lighten up Bill, "usual suspects" is a term of endearment, and... (3) It is not "badmouthing" when I fail to mention someone, and no one ever mentioned much less accused Eightbore of buying Parkers on the sly; but why should that be a PGCA thought crime, anyway?

Wouldn't it be a breath of fresh air if a person could get on a website dedicated to collecting and shooting a particular gun (Parker or LCS) and simply mention that he had a certain make and model and bore-size, etc., etc...that wanted a new owner. Or when a collector/shooter might want a specific grade in a particular bore size with defined features, wouldn't it be convenient to query the most interested and active group of web junkies about the possibilities?

What's even worse, is that if someone who is not presently blocked from the PGCA website, like my friend Eightbore, should venture to post my prior paragraph verbatim on the hallowed Forum, rest assured the post would soon disappear along with any and all responses, and likely Mr. Bill would join EDM in the "penalty box" of excommunication.

In this context we should be thankful that Bill's referral of the offending poster of the DHE for sale to this website did not violate the spirit of the PGCA rules by way of "conspiracy" to sell a DHE indirectly. In fact, for $10 the DHE can be listed here and then discussed at length on the PGCA site. This happens all the time.

Apparently being listed somewhere else on the Internet cleanses and sanctifies the otherwise offending transaction. Assuming that the DHE's owner gets the gun sold to someone who became aware of it in the first instance on the PGCA site, after it was listed here, then isn't this all just a silly conversation about the illogical result of a silly rule that is honored in its violation? Here's what I suggest:

Anyone who wants to buy or sell a Parker should first list it on doublegunshop.com Then he arranges with a friend or two to "discover" the listing and post the gun-for-sale details on the PGCA Forum along with the blue-line code that allows a person to simply click over to the $10 listing here. Once having established that the gun is being sold elsewhere, it becomes fair game. This happens all the time. However, the best place to spread the word is an interactive Forum.

If the censors purged the PGCA Forum of all discussions of what one would "aspire" to in a Parker and all the discussions of guns putatively for sale elsewhere there would be scant new info beyond "Me and Joe went hunting..." and "I got me a Parker and can anybody tell..." And as I said before, I have no guns for sale and have never bought or even looked for a gun on the Internet. Yet I verily believe if the seven powers-that-be put it to a vote of the 1,000 members, the vote would be 993 to 7 in favor of more and better information exchanged, more transparency, freer networking, and less censorship of the PGCA Forum.

As a parting shot, and example how anal retentive this had once become, back when I was still a welcome participant, I referred to my friend Dick Baldwin (now deceased) in a post, and it came through the website censorship filter as D*** Baldwin. Adults on a website dedicated to fine side-by-side shotguns were spared viewing and burning the eyes with Richard's nick name, which he used on the ATA/HOF website he managed, and on his books and magazine articles. My God! When I was in first and second grade I learned to read with "Dick and Jane" readers. As I have often said, this site is a breath of fresh air. EDM

The truth is no one is blocked from posting on the PGCA site. If a person has enough brain cells to turn on a computer, they have enough brain cells to sidestep the whims of the site's Moderators. The only hard and fast rule is that you have to use a real name.

Damn, GregSy. You just made bourbon come out of my nose with that one.

GregSY: While I was at Mayo Clinic two years ago my name was blocked somehow,for some undisclosed reason (and no one had the balls to even tell me). When I got home and back on my own computer the supposed preexisting cookie did not allow me to be signed in automatically by simply hitting "Favorates," like works here. I tried to sign in and was rejected; when I tried to re-register, thinking perhaps my cookie had expired or been purged by defragging or some firewall glitch, the effort resulted in a message that I was "blocked." Meanwhile, I had greater issues to deal with for about 6 months...

Finally, when my situation improved, I decided to test the system and signed in under a nom de fusil--Irving Quasvera--and, as a newbie, I was welcomed with open arms. So for a little fun I started playing it like a violin...and my persona started coming through...and some honchos started to suspect...and then poor old Irving got blocked and all his threads disappeared. It is a fact that, as you say, any one with brain cells can side-step the censorship, but why bother.

The day my new book was released was the day that the PGCA website became redundant for me (I'd rather be here). It would have been nice to have access for the prior year to simply respond to posted queries about my new book in process at the publisher, and to give updates to my almost 200 pre-publication subscribers. But that's water over the dam. The book is launched and all over the Internet. Amazon.com has at least 22 dealers cutting each others' throats, and, of course, there's eBay. My work is done. I could easily get on parkergun.org, but why but in where I'm not welcome?

The anomaly of this is that virtually no one with any Parker credentials ever chimes in on parkergun.org and the Officers/BODs (with one exception) avoid it like the plague (although they watch it like hawks; or is it middle-school hall monitors?). Meanwhile I see many name players on this site who have books in print and others who obviously know their stuff. Remember the Damascus barrel thread with over 40,000 hits? Somebody could precipitate that thread down and have a book. EDM

Hey EDM- or may I say Ed. I'm an Irishman, and you can "bad-mouth" me. as others have, and I won't mind- I'm almost flattered by the "attention". But somehow, even though odds say the Detroit Lions will win a SuperBowl before we ever meet, I don't think you would do that. Not because I'm a "nobody" a working class stiff- in fact, no different than some of the folks who get on those dumbassed TV "Jackpot" shows- "Deal or No Deal" comes to mind- and through no great skill or high I.Q.- walk away a millionaire-

As I know very little about Parker (or Ithaca or other fine double gun history) I throughly enjoy reading and re-reading your posts here, and I am grateful we have a fair-minded gent. like Dave W. "at the helm of the good ship Double Gun Shoppe, Ltd. Inc. and PDQ--" The PGCA forum's apparent FUBAR with your former posting priviledges is their loss, and our gain.

What little I know about good doubles (side-bys- I am NOT a O/U man- I've picked up enough 2 x 4's on Habitat 4 Humanity projects, thanks anyway) I learned from the McIntosh book "Best Guns"- I bought a used copy of the Peter Johnson book on Parkers, believe it came out in 1961, and I read that- My late wife gave me a copy of Jack O'Connor's Shotgun Book, still have it (actually two copies, one signed- also his rifle book and others- I like crusty Irish authors, by the by)and learned that old curmudgeonly Jack was "just a bit prejudiced" for the fine Winchester Model 21 doubles (out of my price range)--

A few years ago I bought a copy of the Larry Baer book on the Parker Gun- didn't do much for me however- the ils. of the component parts and older price lists-fine detail, too much writing about high end Parkers we will most likely never see- Hollywood Celebs and this "Walking Thom" A-1 skeet gun unfired? Huum--anyway, if Santa comes through for this old Hibernian reprobate as I have asked, and I end up with a copy of your book on the Old Reliable, I'll spend the long winter months enjoying it, with a glass or two of Irish cheer-if we ever should meet, I'll gladly stand you to a glass or two (as long as we are shooting the "breeze' and not firearms of course. RWTF

FUBAR brings back memories. In 1963, when I was in the Navy on a carrier out of Alameda CA, some of my boat racing buddies from Milwaukee had moved to Marin County, north of San Francisco. They set me up with a boat to race, and I designed a new hull for them, christened "FUBAR." If you know how to search old-time stock outboard racing on the internet you will find references to our boat and the setting of a world speed record in 1964 at Modesto CA. That people still remember such an obscure event is an amazement.

As to Peter Johnson, he wrote his book in 1958-60 and then disappeared till about 1994, when I tracked him down in Falls Church VA. I did a taped interview just before he died, which was published in the DGJ. Last July I was in Montana, less than 30 miles from Larry Baer's place. I called but no answer. Maybe next summer. I think it's important to follow up with these people who jump started our collectors' area of interest.

When I was just out of high school, racing around in my A Stock Hydro in 1959, Peter Johnson's book was still a handwritten manuscript in process, yet to be typed with carbon copies by a public steno at the University of VA, where he taught.

When I was just out of law school and learning to be a lawyer in 1972, Larry Baer's book was a work in process, which preceded computers and, at best, was a hunt-and-peck typewritten manuscript helped along by xerox copies (no floppy discs or CD's). Knowing how the publication process works now, I can appreciate how difficult it was back in the 1960s and 1970s. Yet one thing has changed for the worse: The Internet sops up all the spare that time gun cranks once devoted to reading books. I caught the end of paper and ink publishing with my first book in 1995-97; now the Internet is supreme. Rats! All this in a blink of an eye; I'll be 68 next month. Double Rats!!

EDM