Southron Sr.
12-11-2017, 03:02 PM
I am just wondering.
I owned two original Cook and Brother Rifles at one time. THE STOCKS WERE DIFFERENT. My conclusion was that as opposed to Springfield Armory and the numerous Yankee rifle-musket contractors that had Ames stock making machinery {along with the C.S. armories at Richmond/Macon and Fayetteville that used Ames machinery captured at Harpers Ferry) that produced identical, machine made stocks; the gun stocks at the Cook Armory were all handmade by several different workmen and consequently varied slightly in their dimensions.
By the way, the old Cook Armory building constructed by the Cook Brothers during "the war" is still standing in Athens, GA. Over the years since the war the building has been used as a cotton mill, a band aid factory and it now houses some of the administrative offices of the University of Georgia. Local rumor in Athens has it that when the old Cook & Brother building was enlarged after the war, many unused Cook & Brother barrels found stored in a room of the old armory building were used as rebar when a new concrete floor was cast when the building was enlarged during its cotton mill era.
I owned two original Cook and Brother Rifles at one time. THE STOCKS WERE DIFFERENT. My conclusion was that as opposed to Springfield Armory and the numerous Yankee rifle-musket contractors that had Ames stock making machinery {along with the C.S. armories at Richmond/Macon and Fayetteville that used Ames machinery captured at Harpers Ferry) that produced identical, machine made stocks; the gun stocks at the Cook Armory were all handmade by several different workmen and consequently varied slightly in their dimensions.
By the way, the old Cook Armory building constructed by the Cook Brothers during "the war" is still standing in Athens, GA. Over the years since the war the building has been used as a cotton mill, a band aid factory and it now houses some of the administrative offices of the University of Georgia. Local rumor in Athens has it that when the old Cook & Brother building was enlarged after the war, many unused Cook & Brother barrels found stored in a room of the old armory building were used as rebar when a new concrete floor was cast when the building was enlarged during its cotton mill era.