Found a USFA "Sears Gun"

[Capt. John Fitzgerald]

Dropped by one of the local gun shops today and found a treasure trove of engraved USFA guns.
There in the display case were three of them.  A "Pony Express" gun - as seen in the current USFA catalog - with Master A engraving, another SA with Armory B engraving and a third with Armory D full coverage and checkered ivory grips with eagle emblem.  As I was looking them over the shop owner came over to me and said, "I have a USFA Sears Gun in the safe if you want to see it."  Needless to say, I said YES!  Beautiful gun, to say the least.  This particular gun had elephant ivory grips.
It seems that the previous owner of these guns passed away about two years ago.  He had a very large collection of Colts and, in recent years, has started adding engraved USFA guns to his collection.  Sadly, he died the day after he received the Sears Gun. 

A few observations:

The gun with the Armory D engraving must have been a VERY EARLY US Patent FA gun.  It had an Uberti hammer with the hammer block safety.  I used to have an early "Patent" gun but it did not have the Uberti style hammer, though it did have a cut out in the frame's hammer channel to accommodate the hammer block safety. This is the first Patent gun I have seen with the Uberti style hammer.

The "inexpensive" Armory engraving is impressive!  Very professional looking.

One thing I noted about both Armory and Master grade engraving is how relatively shallow the engraving is.  It is not that deep relief, eye catching style of engraving that you see on Colts and S&W's.  It has, for lack of a better description, a sort of one dimensional look to it.  Even so, it looks pretty good.