POTD: The Winchester 1 of 1,000 – Won the West and the Movies
Welcome to today’s Photo of the Day! Here we have one of the true holy grails of American gun collecting. This is a Winchester Model 1876 “One of One Thousand,” a rifle that sits in the same rarefied air as a Colt Walker.
Here’s what the grade meant. Winchester test-fired rifles in batches and set aside the most accurate barrels, selling the very best as “One of One Thousand” at a steep premium, $80 to $100 back when a working man made a couple of bucks a day. It wasn’t just fancy engraving. It was a factory-certified tack-driver, and serious hunters paid up for the edge.
The Model 1876 was the “Centennial,” named for America’s 100th birthday and Winchester’s first big-bore lever gun, chambered here in .45-75 for big game out West. The 1 of 1000 version is staggeringly rare: only 55 were ever built, and fewer than half are thought to survive. This one is the fourth listed in the factory ledgers, with just one earlier survivor known, wearing the earliest “open top” receiver and a rare set of inlaid silver barrel bands.
If the name rings a bell, thank Hollywood. The 1950 Jimmy Stewart film “Winchester ’73” built its whole plot around a One of One Thousand, and the studio’s promotional contest flushed out forgotten examples and lit the collector market on fire.
Best part: this one was factory inscribed to H.C. Gove of Albany, a milkman who ran one of the city’s biggest routes before heading west chasing mines. You didn’t have to be a Rockefeller to carry a king’s rifle.
Most of our POTDs utilize images from our friends at Rock Island Auction Company, the premier firearms auction in the United States. Take some time to browse their current auctions – who knows, maybe you’ll find a piece of history to take home!
“Inscribed Winchester ‘One of One Thousand’ Model 1876 Rifle.” Rock Island Auction, www.rockislandauction.com/detail/4097/11/inscribed-winchester-one-of-one-thousand-model-1876-rifle. Accessed 3 July 2026.
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