.400NitroExpress and new guy,

I'll go to Chadick's to look when they have something I find interesting, but usually I prefer to avoid that town, because you can't spit in the city of Terrell without hitting an art gallery or an antique shop, and since those shops took over it seems as though the natives claim that everything is rare, priceless, valuable, antique, or an "heirloom passed down through the generations."

I think the reason Chadick's started with the American guns is because they were available cheap 20 or 30 years ago. What I was told when working part time in a gun shop while attending college was that Chadick's started with the American double shotguns and antique Colt SAA's and Winchesters, buying a lot of their inventory from other dealers. Twenty years ago in Texas, I remember customers who were glad to swap a decent double shotgun for a new Remington 870 or 1100...they were sometimes amazed that they could get anything for it, saying "but that thing only holds two shots." The dealers could not sell them easily and so they resold the traded double guns to Chadick's and other specialty shops. The same situation was common with the old Colts and Winchesters, they were frequently considered nothing but old guns that nobody wanted. Chadick's and similar shops were able to sell them easily for closer to book value because they advertised nationwide and therefore had a larger number of potential customers, which made for a pretty good profit margin.

Richard.