Early history Predecessors The ancestor of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company was the
Horace Smith and
Daniel Wesson partnership of Norwich, Connecticut (not to be confused with the famous
Smith & Wesson Revolver Company founded later by the same men). Smith and Wesson acquired Lewis Jennings' improved version of inventor
Walter Hunt's 1848 "Volition Repeating Rifle" and its caseless "
Rocket Ball" ammunition, which had been produced in small numbers by Robbins & Lawrence of Windsor, Vermont. Jennings' rifle was a commercial failure, and Robbins & Lawrence ceased production in 1852. Smith designed a much-improved rifle based on Jennings' design, and the partners also hired away Robbins & Lawrence shop foreman
Benjamin Tyler Henry. In 1855, the Smith and Wesson partnership, in order to manufacture the "Volcanic" lever-action rifle and pistol, sought investors and incorporated as the
Volcanic Repeating Arms Company. Its largest stockholder was clothing manufacturer
Oliver Winchester. Winchester had the basic design of the
Henry rifle completely modified and improved to become the first Winchester rifle, the Model 1866, which fired the same .44 caliber rimfire cartridges as the Henry but had an improved magazine (with the addition of a loading gate on the right side of the receiver, invented by Winchester employee Nelson King) and, for the first time, a wooden forend. The Henry and the 1866 Winchester shared a unique double firing pin that struck the head of the rimfire cartridge in two places when the weapon was fired, increasing the chances that the fulminate in the hollow rim would ignite the 28 or so grains of black powder inside the case. Another extremely popular model was rolled out in 1873. The Model 1873 introduced the first Winchester center fire cartridge, the .44-40 WCF (Winchester Center Fire). These rifle families are commonly known as the "Gun That Won the West." The Model 1873 was followed by the Model 1876 (or "Centennial Model"), a larger version of the '73, which used the same toggle-link action and brass cartridge elevator used in the Henry. It was chambered for longer, more powerful cartridges such as
.45-60 WCF,
.45-75 WCF, and .50-95 WCF. The action was not long enough to allow Winchester to achieve their goal of producing a repeating rifle capable of handling the
.45-70 Government cartridge; this would not happen until they began manufacture of the
Browning-designed Model 1886. Oliver Winchester died in December 1880; his son and successor,
William Wirt Winchester, died of tuberculosis four months later. William Wirt Winchester's widow,
Sarah Winchester, used her inheritance and income from the company to build what is now known as the
Winchester Mystery House. From 1883,
John Browning worked in partnership with the Winchester Repeating Arms Company and designed a series of rifles and shotguns, most notably the
Winchester Model 1885 Single Shot, Winchester
Model 1887 lever-action shotgun,
Model 1897 pump-action shotgun; and the lever-action
Model 1886,
Model 1892,
Model 1894 and
Model 1895 rifles. Several of these are still in production today through companies such as
Browning,
Rossi, Navy Arms, and others which have revived several of the discontinued models or produced reproductions.
20th-century developments The turn of the twentieth century The early years of the twentieth century found the Winchester Repeating Arms Company competing with new
John Browning designs, manufactured under license by other firearm companies. The race to produce the first commercial
self-loading rifle brought forth the .22 rimfire
Winchester Model 1903 and later centerfire
Model 1905,
Model 1907, and
Model 1910 rifles. Winchester engineers, after ten years of work, designed the
Model 1911 to circumvent Browning's self-loading shotgun patents, prepared by the company's very own patent lawyers. One of Winchester's premier engineers,
T.C. Johnson, was instrumental in the development of these self-loading firearms and went on to superintend the designs of Winchester's classic
Model 1912,
Model 52 and
Model 54.
The First World War The company was a major producer of the .303
Pattern 1914 Enfield rifle for the
British Government and the similar .30-06
M1917 Enfield rifle for the United States during
World War I. Working at the Winchester plant during the war, Browning developed the final design of the
Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR), of which it produced some 27,000. Browning and the Winchester engineers also developed the Browning .50 caliber machine gun during the war. The caliber
.50 BMG (12.7 x 99 mm) ammunition for it was designed by the Winchester ballistic engineers. The commercial rights to these new Browning guns were owned by
Colt.
Failure and recovery During the war, Winchester had borrowed heavily to finance its massive expansion. With the return of peace, the company attempted to use its surplus production capacity and pay down its debt by trying to become a general manufacturer of consumer goods – everything from kitchen knives to roller skates to refrigerators, to be marketed through 'Winchester Stores'. They also merged with the
Simmons Hardware Company. The Winchester and
Keen Kutter brands did business together during the 1920s, but in 1929, they agreed to separate and returned to their core businesses. The consumer goods strategy was a failure for Winchester, and the Great Depression put the final nail in the company's coffin. The Winchester Repeating Arms Company went into
receivership in 1931 and was bought at a bankruptcy auction by the Olin family's
Western Cartridge Company on December 22 of that year. Oliver Winchester's firm would maintain a nominal existence until 1935 when Western Cartridge merged with its subsidiary to form the Winchester-Western Company. In 1944, the firearms and ammunition operations would be reorganized as the Winchester-Western Division of
Olin Industries. Western's First Vice-President (
John M. Olin) was a sportsman and gun enthusiast, and he started at once to restore the Winchester brand to its former luster by concentrating on its classic models and updated versions thereof, with particular attention to quality and prestige. Olin personally pushed the deluxe
Model 52 Sporter and the semi-custom
Model 21 double-barreled shotgun. Winchester flourished, even during the later Depression.
The Second World War ) move Winchester firearms during World War II The U.S.
M1 carbine (technically not a
carbine in the sense of a short version of a parent rifle) was designed at Winchester by an eight-man team including Edwin Pugsley, Bill Roemer,
Marsh Williams, Fred Humiston, Cliff Warner, and Ralph Clarkson, although the popular press played up the role of ex-convict Williams. More M1 carbines were manufactured by Winchester and other firms than any other U.S. small arm of World War II. During
World War II, Winchester produced the
M1 Garand rifle and post-war was the first civilian manufacturer of the
M14 rifle.
Decline By the 1960s, the rising cost of skilled labor was making it increasingly unprofitable to produce Winchester's classic designs, as they required considerable hand-work to finish. In particular, Winchester's flagship
Model 12 pump shotgun and
Model 70 bolt-action rifle with their machined forgings could no longer compete in price with Remington's cast-and-stamped
870 and
700. Accordingly, S. K. Janson formed a new Winchester design group to advance the use of "modern" engineering design methods and manufacturing principles in gun design. The result was a new line of guns that replaced most of the older products in 1963–1964. The immediate reaction of the shooting press and public was overwhelmingly negative: the popular verdict was that Winchester had sacrificed quality to the "cheapness experts," and Winchester was no longer considered to be a prestige brand, causing a marked loss of market share. To this day, gun collectors consider "post-64" Winchesters to be both less desirable and less valuable than their predecessors. In the early 1970s, the Olin Winchester-Western Division tried to diversify with at least two unsuccessful attempts. The first was an experimental indoor shooting range called
Wingo in San Diego, California. This short-lived attempt had a strong tie to firearms and ammunition with exclusive guns, ammo, and target launching machines being produced. The flaw was to see it quickly profitable in a western city with too many competing outdoor activities. The second venture was trying to compete with
Coleman Company in the camping and sporting goods market. "Trailblazer by Winchester" products included propane-fueled stoves and lanterns. They also produced tents and sleeping bags. These products struggled to compete with similar offerings from an established company founded in 1900. Labor costs continued to rise through the 1960s and '70s, and a prolonged and bitter strike in 1979–1980 ultimately convinced Olin that firearms could no longer be produced profitably in New Haven. In December 1980, the New Haven plant was sold to its employees, incorporated as the
U.S. Repeating Arms Company, and granted a license to make Winchester arms. Olin retained the Winchester ammunition business. U.S. Repeating Arms itself went bankrupt in 1989. After bankruptcy, it was acquired by a French holding company, then sold to Belgian arms makers
Herstal Group, which also owns gun makers
FN Herstal and
Browning Arms Company. On January 16, 2006,
U.S. Repeating Arms announced it was closing its
New Haven plant where Winchester rifles and shotguns had been produced for 140 years. Along with the closing of the plant, production of the Model 94 rifle (the descendant of the original
Winchester rifle), Model 70 rifle, and Model 1300 shotgun were discontinued. The official press release sent out by U.S. Repeating Arms concerning the closure was released on January 17, 2006. The text is included below:
Recovery On August 15, 2006, Olin Corporation, owner of the Winchester trademarks, announced that it had entered into a new license agreement with Browning Arms Company to make Winchester brand rifles and shotguns, though not at the closed Winchester plant in New Haven. The production of
Model 1885 falling block action,
Model 1892 and
Model 1886 lever-action rifles are produced under licensed agreement by
Miroku Corp. of Japan and imported to the United States by Browning. In 2008, FN Herstal announced that it would produce Model 70 rifles at its plant in Columbia, South Carolina. In 2013, assembly was moved to Portugal. In the summer of 2010, FN Herstal resumed production of the Winchester model 1894 and the evolution of the Winchester 1300, now called the Winchester SXP. A number of gun cleaning kits, Chinese folding knives, tools, and other accessories are also now sold under the Winchester trademark.
SXP shotgun recall In April 2015, the company recalled several variants of its SXP-model 12-gauge shotguns that the company says may unintentionally fire while the action is being closed. == Ammunition ==