Award Winning High Art Contemporary Cased Pennsylvania Long Rifle and Accessories Made for Douglas Lawrence Joy by Hugh Toenjes

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Historic Firearms and Early Militaria: Premie...

By Cowan's Auctions

Oct 30, 2018

Set Reminder 2018-10-30 10:00:00 2018-10-30 10:00:00 America/New_York Bidsquare Bidsquare : Historic Firearms and Early Militaria: Premier Auction https://www.bidsquare.com/auctions/cowans/historic-firearms-and-early-militaria-premier-auction-3521
Cowan's is honored to present the Magnificent Sword Collection of William Koch in its two-day firearms, militaria, and American history auction, with a focus on the Civil War. Cowan's Auctions dawnie@cowans.com

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• Lot Description
  Award Winning High Art Contemporary Cased Pennsylvania Long Rifle and Accessories Made for Douglas Lawrence Joy by Hugh Toenjes
  
  

  .480 bore diameter, 42" octagonal barrel, German silver blade front sight, very fancy notched rear barrel sight finish in a polished blue. The barrel is gold inlaid with leaves and vines at the breech, front muzzle has gold lines around the muzzle, just behind the front sight is vine and leaves. All screw heads are highly chiseled and finished in highly polished blue finish. The lock is deeply chiseled with vines and leaves. Sterling silver furniture, the stock is incised carved with line and borders. The stock has silver wire inlays, four-piece highly engraved patchbox with the name in a gold plaque " Douglas E Joy ." Engraved bone inlays on the wrist and cheek piece. The stock has a fancy high grade maple with high gloss finish. Beautifully made and equally ordained case with silver name plaque, top of the lid with silver wire inlays. The inside is form fitted to the rifle and tools. With maker's label. It took 3 years to make a rifle of this quality. It is fit for a king and made by American Custom Gun Maker's Guild member Hugh Toenjes.
  
  The Surprise of a Lifetime By Hugh Toenjes
  
  Under one's bed is a good place to hide "dust bunnies" but not the usual place to store expensive firearms, let alone one that has an estimated value between $75,000 - $100,000. Imagine the shock then, when a daughter cleaned out her deceased father's apartment and found exactly that! This is the rest of a tale that begin in 1979 when a gun collector and business man attended a gun show where I was exhibiting my latest work as a fledgling muzzle loading gun maker. Along with my display of longrifles was a rifle I had made form my son's 12th birthday. His rifle was inspired by the work of Nicholas Hawk of Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania. It was dark in color with silver mountings, wire inlay and engraving. During the show, the rifle caught the eye of Douglas Joy, a successful local business man with an extensive collection of long guns. A short time later a man riding a loud Harley Davidson motorcycle arrives at my shop wearing a black leather jacket, motorcycle boots, and silver skull rings on his fingers. He introduced himself as Doug Joy and brought with a coffee table book picturing many guns from the 18th and 19th centuries that had been made for wealthy patrons and kings. Shown were guns hammered full of silver, gold, jewels and engraved to the nines. He opened the book to a page showing a particularly ornate European gun and said, "I want you to make on of these to me". I was stunned! He added that the price of the project would not be an issue. This is every gun maker's dream, or so I thought. Then reality struck and I informed Mr. Joy that I only built American long rifles, expecting that would be the end of the discussion right then and there. "Well then, build me a fancy longrifle and I want lots of silver, gold and precious stones on it"! Once again, I was taken back. Naturally, I was a bit wary but judging by his appearance saying "no" might not be an easy option. I considered the project with anxiety as the magnitude of the project flashed across the screen of my mind. A lot of skills associated with the venture I had yet to learn.
  
  The next year I became very acquainted with "Doug" Joy as we hammered out the details of his elaborate longrifle. It would be maple stocked Lehigh County style similar to my son's rifle with a 50 caliber hand rifled barrel. With his handsome down payment, I was able to order most of the materials along with a copy of J.B. Meek's "The Art of Engraving", which proved a valuable resource. As 1981 began, it was time to start work on the fancy longrifle. I already had several curly maple stock blanks on hand from Pennsylvania and I decided to make the lock from Bud Siler castings. The barrel would be made from a blank that I would rifle myself. At the time, I was just perfecting my own style of deep oval bottom rifling which offered excellent accuracy and eliminated the need to wipe between shots. As work progressed on the fancy rifle, we decided it should be cased with complete accessories for shooting. Now, I had another hurdle to jump as my estimated time to complete the project was increased by another year! My original price was replaced by an open-ended materials and labor contract. Doug had no problem with this and his only concern was "when will you ever get it finished"? Despite his expressed desire for the finished gun, he subsequently requested that I put eagles on his gun, throwing me another curve ball. How was I going to insert eagles on his rifle and still maintain my original artistic vision for the gun? After, many sleepless nights and facing more ire from my wife, who by now was a workshop widow, I came up with a novel idea. I had just made the acquaintance of Kelly Mulford, a master scrimshander from Bellingham, Washington. His work on fossil ivory which I would inlet into the stock. Kelly said he would be honored to add his art work to mine. His eagles were beautiful and appear today as if he scribed them yesterday. By the end of 1983, I was putting the finishing touches on the project, so a date was set for Doug to take possession of the project. On the appointed day, he arrives with a bonus gift for me--2 bottles of Dom Perignon. We consumed on the spot!
  
  After, taking the cased set home, Doug placed the entire set on the center of his dining room table. He then proceeded to examine the rifle with a magnifying glass for the remainder of the night. The next morning he called me on the phone and said, "I stayed up all night with a magnifier and I could not find one mistake--you are one hell of a gun maker"! After many months on Doug's dining room table, the cased set found its way into his gun vault/room. He allowed me to borrow it from time to time for display at gun shows. In 1985, the rifle was on display at the NRA Convention in Seattle, Washington where it caught the attention of a newly formed group called The American Custom Gunmaker's Guild. Three members of that Guild each signed an endorsement for me to join their Guild. Alas, it was not till many years later that I actually joined. Doug's rifle was also displayed at the World's Fair Expo 86, British Columbia Pavilion in Vancouver, Canada.
  
  In 1989, I phoned Doug to ask if I could borrow the cased rifle for a show and my heart hit the floor when he told me it had been stolen! "How the hell could this happen", was my first reaction. Apparently, it was only the rifle that was taken as the case and accessories were untouched. Doug told me he had been to a show the night before and because it was late when he returned he left the cased set just inside the locked front door of his apartment. I was subsequently asked to do an appraisal for the insurance company and I contacted the editors of several periodicals to announce the theft, as well as tell of a reward Doug was offering. One of the magazines I wrote to was "Muzzle Blasts". The ad was published July 1989. For all I knew from that day to June of 2016, the rifle, a product of several years of effort, was lost indefinitely.
  
  Fast forward to 2016 when I received an e-mail from a woman who claimed to be in possession of a very fancy rifle that had my name on the barrel. She was asking for information and could I tell her anything about it. I requested photos and to my amazement, she sent me pictures of Doug's rifle. She was his daughter and she informed me that Doug had passed away a year earlier. The fancy rifle had been left to her. Apparently some years after the theft and through some detective work of his own, Doug was able to find the rifle and repossess it. I was shocked but also elated! Fearful of another mishap, Doug had put the whole project in a wooden crate and shoved it under his bed where it remained for the next 27 years collecting "dust bunnies."

  Condition

  This rifle, made for display and exhibition, is in new condition. A very fine and highly decorated custom made contemporary longrifle.
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• Buyer's Premium

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