If anyone has a set laying around and would like to part with them they are for a friend's (I hope he doesn't mind me saying "friend", but anybody that likes "elsies" is a friend to me.) Crown Grade. Hopefully he will not mind me putting this piece of history in, I'm sure everyone will like it.
"As a bit of interest, I have been a serious collector of guns, many of them L. C.’s and one of my prized guns is a Crown grade which is sort of unfinished. The story goes that the gun was returned to the factory for a new set of barrels, it being a gun that was with blown barrels. The gun was last used by its original owner when duck hunting with John Olin. The Smith got muddied barrels and burst. The cost of retubing the gun was sort of expensive and Olin supposedly told the owner to forget the repairs and “get a good gun.” Olin had the Winchester Custom shop make his friend a Model 21 as a gift. The Crown grade was left without an owner. Tom Robinson fitted a set of Sir Joseph Whitworth 32 inch barrels to it in the most expert fashion but was only able to fit an extractor fore end iron that was immediately available. Of course Tom died and the gun is crying for an ejector iron. I have searched, without success for an iron and hopefully I can get one and have it put to use. I have used the gun for duck shooting and found that one barrel (the selected one) will eject the shell and the second will be lifted."
This gentleman has other great stories as he and Frank Kenna Jr (President of Marlin), Tom Robinson (R&D for Marlin) used to hunt together. Also FW S1 (Crown Grade) was presented to Frank's brother Roger (then President of Marlin) as a gift from the employees.