In 1936, the Winchester Model 70 began its reign as king of sporting bolt-action rifles, but it lost much of that prestige in 1964 when corporate cost-cutting measures required a change in design. An updated version of the revered “pre-’64” Model 70 emerged again in the early 1990s, only to succumb to a near-fatal blow in 2006. Now the “Rifleman’s Rifle” is back, this time built in Columbia, S.C. Could this latest Model 70 be the best?
By Brian C. Sheetz, Senior Executive Editor
It was a cold, mid-January day in 2006 that brought news of U.S. Repeating Arms Co.’s intention to permanently cease operations at its New Haven, Conn., manufacturing plant—a site that had been in operation for more than 140 years and that had produced many of America’s most famous and prized sporting and military arms. An official announcement laid out the bleak situation in sparse, dispassionate terms, “The decision puts 186 manufacturing employees out of work, and at this time brings to an end the Model 70 and 94 rifles and Model 1300 shotgun.”
For fans of the guns, especially the Model 70, the news was nearly incomprehensible. It was an even more devastating blow than the now-infamous 1964 debacle in which the Winchester catalog shamelessly heralded “improved” models—including Model 70s billed as “the best ones yet”—despite their significantly economized manufacture. It would be three decades before the company, then absorbed by a conglomerate that also owned Browning, redeemed the Model 70’s reputation.
In the early 1990s, the owner of U.S. Repeating Arms Company began to replace the company’s antiquated manufacturing equipment with modern machining centers—in part to produce new receivers and bolts for a truly improved version of the original pre-’64 Model 70. The project got under way just before the company razed the aging factory and erected an entirely new structure nearby. When those first Super Grades were released through its Custom Shop (February 1990, p. 24), response was much greater than expected, and a full-production version soon followed from the new facility (March 1994, p. 36).
No less an authority on single-shots and bolt-actions than former American Rifleman Contributing Editor Frank de Haas, praised the new gun shortly before his death in 1994, writing, “The Classic is truly a classic any way you look at it, but it has a number of things that are new. To be honest, I must say that some of the features are minor, but these, added to a couple of important changes, make the Classic a better rifle. As much as us old-timers revere the pre-’64 model, it must be said that the Classic is an updated and improved rifle with changes that actually make it a better gun.”
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