Classic look Marlin .22 magnum

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Joined
Nov 30, 2004
Messages
3,508
Location
Alabama, in the bend of the Tennessee River
I bought this old Marlin .22 Magnum from Bob (weaselmeatgravy here on the forum) a few weeks ago. I did want a scope on it but wanted a classic look. A lot of more modern scopes are kinda chunky looking with too many protrusion. I asked my buddy (Nimrod308) what he had in his spare scope box, and he came up with this old K-4 Weaver which i though was just the look I was after. A set of classic Weaver tip-off rings were procured from forum member Win64.. I think it turned out pretty good.
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Nice ! I really love those old Marlin bolt 22s , especially the mags. I have started collecting them . They are super accurate with the micro groove barrels .
 
This is definitely an older one - doesn't even have a serial number, which makes it pre 1968. Of course being a .22 mag it's post 1960-ish, so somewhere in that time frame. Has the goofy backwards safety that Marlin persisted with for years. Never did understand that - a manufacturing expediency no doubt.
 
I have the tube magazine version (783) complete with Marlin branded leather sling. Mine has a modern Vortex scope and Leupold rings. Got it to fill the hole left behind when I sold my 25MN for way more than I paid.

I wanted a bolt 22WMR Marlin but I wanted the tube magazine ... and the older 78X series has the white spacer walnut stock unlike the 25X series with "hardwood". I even had a Marlin branded 12-round (could force 13 in) box magazine for my 25MN (that would fit the OP's rifle) that I since sold for A LOT on either Marlin forum (when I still "visited" there) or 24-hour campfire. Go get one just for the chase, not easy to find.

Oh, there's another 25MN for sale by someone I have traded with before local to me for cheaper than it's worth so ... might end up with another.

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I had a 783 with walnut stock back in the 80s - I was pretty much of a poor boy at the time and that was my varmint/predator calling rifle - and a good one out to 150 yards. My whole firearms battery at the time was a Browning 12 gauge shotgun, the Marlin 783, a Marlin 39A, a Golden State Arms Mauser .30-06, and a 6.5" S&W model 29. Plus a Charter Arms Undercover .38 for a carry gun. Come to think of it, I was pretty well armed.
 
Lovely. I expect you are smarter than me with that sling…I had a collector grade 10/22 finger groove that went to shooter grade when the sling brass scratched up the stock while in a case on a bumpy ride.

For that very reason I tie all my slings with leather shoe lace. It may wear some but no scratches.
 
Very nice bolt gun! My late friend in SW Texas had two 22 Mag rifles---A minty Marlin lever-gun and a Rossi pump-gun he used as his "Truck Gun"---very well used, but still worked... Very handy caliber for the many desert critters around his area... I shot the Marlin many times when I visited him there...
 
These JM 22's are really being sought after these days . I personally have been gathering up 22 mag's . I just wonder if Ruger will bring back the marlin rimfires in the future ,they show them on the marlin website , ........ Will wait and see ....😉
 
It's not just the JM's ... the later JM's are trash too. It's any Marlin old enough to have JM as well as walnut. I won't have a Marlin made after 2000 even though the Remlins started in 2010.
 
I have one of the mag fed bolt actions. I was 16 and had gotten an after school job. I gave daddy the money to go buy it for me. It is the source of a lot of good memories.
There was an older man that ran a wood yard across from daddy's store. He was never married and didn't cook. He had done very good in life and was well off. He saw me cleaning some squirrels one afternoon on the store porch, victims of the 22mag. He said "I'll give you 5 dollars a piece for them", they were sold. He would take them to the little diner up the road and the ladys there would cook them for him. He told he he would gladly buy what I didn't want to keep. For 5 dollars a piece I almost foundered that old man on squirrels that fall.
The good old days long gone.
 
6GUNSONLY
Thanks for the post. Great rifle, good job on the scope. I looked up your rifle in Brophy's book, History of Marlin firearms. Appears to be a Model 980, the first Marlin rifle chambered in .22 WMRF. The picture matches yours. Made from 1962 to 1970. In 1971 the 980 was replaced by Model 782. A total of 33,643 Model 980 in 22 WMRF rifles were manufactured.
Del J
 
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