Sportsmen who are eligible for complimentary Maine hunting licenses – signifying they have 70 or more candles on their birthday cakes – can recall when racy 16-gauge double-barreled shotguns were as common among bird hunters as cumbersome 12-gauge guns were among waterfowlers. That’s not to say, however, that the 16 was shunned by hunters wearing hooded parkas and hip boots. To the contrary, from the late 1800s to the mid-1900s, patterns fired from 16-gauge shotguns provided many a duck or goose dinner.

Long a standard among Europe’s commonwealth sportsmen – lacking social rank, they weren’t invited to driven bird shoots on grand estates, where lords and ladies shot with matched pairs of expensive 12-bore doubles – the 16 gauge’s popularity crossed the pond with the waves of immigrants that came to this country at the turn of the 20th century. Aesthetically appealing, fast-handling, and a pleasure to shoot, the “sweet 16” won the hearts of bird hunters on both ends of the spectrum: from New England’s thorny grouse and woodcock covers to the Southland’s sprawling plantations thick with honeysuckle and quail.

Suffice it to say, the 16-gauge doubles built by Parker, L.C. Smith, Ithaca, Ainsley-Fox, and the like, were exemplars of the American gun maker’s art. Made entirely by hand, they were produced in models ranging from basic field grades to top-of-the-line pieces embellished with engraving, offset stocks of burled walnut checkered 32 lines to the inch, splinter fore-ends, skeleton butt plates, single or double triggers turned right or left and a selection of grips from straight to pistol to half-pistol. Small wonder that nowadays those guns are highly collectible Americana. Nevertheless, my longtime friend and master gunsmith Bill Morrison, whose shop is located on Middle Road in Bradford, says there hasn’t been a gun made that was too good to be used.

The way I see it, the 16 gauge was the middle child of the shotgun family. It didn’t have the swagger of its big brother, the 12-bore, and it wasn’t fawned over like its younger sibling, the 20-gauge. But given the right loads, chokes, and barrel lengths, the 16’s versatility couldn’t be denied. Therefore, it remained popular long after pump-action and semi-automatic shotguns replaced the traditional but much more expensive doubles. Accordingly, gun racks in sport shops and hardware stores were stocked with 16-gauge Model 97 and Model 12 Winchester pumps and semi-automatics built by Remington and Browning. For the record, it was Browning’s Belgium-made 16-gauge semi-automatics that first earned the appellation, “Sweet 16.”

So it was that many young hunters cut their shooting teeth on the barrels of 16-gauge shotguns. Offhand I’d say those “first guns” were single-shot, hammer-safety models made by Winchester, Savage, Stevens (later Savage-Stevens) or Harrington & Richardson. While most of them spent years propped in cabinets or cradled in the antlers of bucks adorning den walls, others stood in cellar ways or corners of sheds or barns, within quick reach for rousting the crows out of the corn or keeping the fox away from the chicken coop. Until, that is, ownership of the guns was claimed by sons or grandsons who pestered and proved they were old enough and responsible enough to hunt with a shotgun.

It was through similar attrition that I acquired my first shotgun, a full-choke 16-gauge Harrington & Richardson “Topper” given to me by my father when I graduated from grammar school. With that gun I shot my first partridge, pheasant, woodcock, rabbit, duck, and Canada goose, all within walking distance of home.

It wasn’t long, though, before I began thinking I could “cross-pile ’em,” as my mentors often said, if I had a shotgun that held more than one shell. My next one, therefore, which I bought with money earned by mowing grass at the cemetery, was a 16-gauge Ithaca Model 37 Featherweight pump that held five shells, with bottom ejection to boot. Then, a few years later, along came the late Carroll Soucie with a 16-gauge double built by Felix Kohler of Saarbrucken, Germany. Being lefthanded, Carroll wasn’t comfortable with the gun because its offset stock and turned triggers were made for righthanded shooters. So he sold it to me.

I don’t know where Carroll got the vintage early 1900s gun that, if memory serves me, was brought to this country after World War II. However, I do know that the aforementioned Bill Morrison repaired and refinished it. Simply put, the gun is a work of art. Moreover, Bill told me it was the hardest hitting 16-gauge that he ever ran shot through: “I shot a pheasant with it that I’d bet was 60 yards off,” he said. I don’t doubt it. I shot a lot of waterfowl, including tough-to-kill sea ducks, with that gun and most of them fell cleanly and floated either feet up or head down. I still use it now and then, as I do the old Ithaca pump, which to this day has never malfunctioned. The last I saw of the old Harrington & Richardson was when I left it with a friend’s teen-aged son, who used it when I took him rabbit hunting. I trust the gun served him as well as it did me.

In buying duck loads for the Ithaca pump – remember when Remington came out with 23/4-inch “magnum” loads? – and bird loads for the German double, I figured I had all the bases covered. But in the meantime, the 16 gauge was being nudged out of the spotlight by the 20 gauge. Why? Ironically, for the same reasons the 16 gauge became so popular among upland hunters. That is, the 20 was slimmer, trimmer, lighter, and a bit quicker than the 16, and it performed equally as well.

Let’s face it, Americans are suckers for trends and styles, and sportsmen are no exception. So enamored did they become with the 20-gauge that the gun companies began turning out models chambered for 3-inch magnum shells. In other words, trying to make a duck gun out of a bird gun. Admittedly, when I followed the crowd and bought a Charles Daly 20-gauge over/under chambered for 3-inch shells, I was eager to try the powerful loads. Let’s just say I wasn’t long in thinking that shooting 3-inch magnums in a 20 gauge was for people who enjoyed sore cheek bones and bruised shoulders. Come to think of it, I can’t recall seeing or hearing of a 16-gauge shotgun chambered for 3-inch shells.

For a while I thought the sweet 16 might make a comeback and again take center stage among upland gunners. But it wasn’t to be. The 20 gauge had captured their fancies for reasons that ranged from real to imagined and, of course, to their wallets. When hunters realized that a 12 gauge and a 20 gauge were all they needed for shooting upland birds and waterfowl, they stopped buying the 16. That, of course, translated to more money saved by not having to stock 16-gauge shells in a variety of shot sizes. Likewise, shot shell manufacturers appreciated the reduction in production costs.

Consequently, it soon became necessary to ask for 16-gauge shells in sport shops and gun shops, because none were arrayed among the 12s and 20s. Clearly, the 16-gauge shotgun had lost its celebrity status. Allowing, then, that forewarned is forearmed, I guarded against the day when 16-gauge shells would no longer be available by purchasing a few boxes of 4s and 71/2s. Tradition is a tyrant, and being an incorrigible traditionalist, I think it’s unfortunate that the majority of young modern hunters will never appreciate the versatility of the 16-gauge shotgun.

All said and done, it’s gratifying when, every now and then, I meet a hunter with a 16-gauge cradled in his arm. The last one I met was a bird hunter toting a Winchester Model 21. Like his hair, the barrels of the gun were getting gray but there were no signs of age in its clean, fluid lines and flawless craftsmanship. Unfortunately, production of the Model 21, the last high-quality double-barreled shotgun made in this country, was discontinued in 1950.

In responding to my notice, “Nice gun you’ve got there,” the hunter told me his grandfather left it to him. Without being maudlin, he disclosed that the gun’s sentimental value meant more to him than its substantial monetary worth. When we eventually went our separate ways, there was no doubt in my mind that, aside from the shells in its chambers, his treasured Model 21 was loaded with memories of old covers, old dogs, and old hunters that he had tagged along with when he was sweet 16.

Tom Hennessey’s columns and artwork can be accessed on the BDN Internet page at www.bangornews.com. Tom’s e-mail address is: thennessey@bangordailynews.net. Website address is: www.tomhennessey.com.