Posted October 30, 2015 2:09 pm by Comments

By Evan Brune

WIN-a-Walther-Anniversary-Book-Set_F

In 1886, about the same time U.S. President Grover Cleveland dedicated the Statue of Liberty, a 28-year-old German army veteran started a workshop in his parents’ home. His name was Carl Walther.

Carl Wilhelm Freund Walther was born on Nov. 22, 1858 in Zella St. Blasii, Germany, and he died on July 9, 1915 in Jena. He founded Walther Arms in 1886, when he was 28 years old.

Beginnings

With simple hand tools, a vise, a small forge, and a foot-pedal lathe, Walther began making Schützen sporting rifles with falling-block actions based off the British Martini system.

He soon found success in this niche and expanded his production to hunting rifles, eventually hiring an apprentice and a journeyman to help him with his work.

“It is easy to see that the roots of the Walther Company began with the extraordinary creativity of its founders,” wrote Wulf-Heinz Pflaumer, editor of “Walther: A German Success Story.”

Creativity was evidently a Walther family trait, as Carl was eventually assisted by all five of his sons: Fritz, Georg, Willy, Erich and Carl.

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For the first two decades of Walther Arms’ existence, the company made sporting guns.

Expansion

In 1903, the prosperous business could no longer run out …Read the Rest

Source:: Guns and Ammo

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