Lot 3545: Al Freeland's Martini Type 'Super Rifle'

This is another very rare example of one of the single shot Martini type "Super Rifles" that were manufactured by Al Freeland before the formal development and production of the more famous MK series single shot rifles. This rifle along with the others we have listed for sale in this auction were purchased directly from the Freeland family estate. This model is briefly discussed in his own autobiography book title: "Uncle Al: The Life and Times Of Inventor/Marksman Albin Freeland", on page 129, and 130. There were exactly 21 one of these hand built rifle actually produced by Al Freeland with this one being serial numbered "019" behind the trigger guard on the loading lever. This rifle was a combination of the Al Freeland, hand made receivers, (similar to the early MK I rifles) with the old style, No. 12/15 extractors system fitted with an exceptional high quality, premier Match grade Eric Johnson barrel. It was then hand fitted with a set of extra fancy, high grade, highly figured walnut buttstock and forend. The forend was shaped like the early Winchester Model 70 marksman stock and fitted with a hand stop rail and custom made walnut hand stop. The forend was also fitted with one of his early custom barrel-band, barrel tuners. The side of the forend and pistol grip area were all hand checkered in a Fleur-de-Lis pattern to provide a better grip area. The buttstock was then fitted with one of Freelands adjustable aluminum buttplates. The barrel is unmarked, although as noted in the reference above the barrels were all manufactured/supplied by Eric Johnson a premier barrel maker in the 1940s-1960s. It is currently fitted with a front sight base and two scope blocks.

Excellent with 98% of the original blue finish overall as applied by the Freeland gunshop. The stock and forend are both in very fine condition with only very minor handling marks with excellent checkering on both sides. A super rare early custom Martini Super Rifle made by Al Freeland.