O.F. Mossberg & Sons
 |
|
| Incorporation | |
| Industry | Firearms |
| Founded | March 1919 |
| Founder | Oscar Frederick Mossberg and sons |
| Headquarters | North Haven, New Haven, Connecticut, United States |
|
Area served
|
worldwide |
|
Key people
|
Alan I. Mossberg (Chairman) Alan Iver Mossberg Jr. (President) |
| Products |
Firearms Scopes |
| US$24,600,000 | |
|
Number of employees
|
500 |
| Website | www.mossberg.com |
O.F. Mossberg & Sons (commonly known as Mossberg) is an American firearms manufacturer, specializing in shotguns, rifles, scopes, and firearm accessories.
Oscar Frederick Mossberg (1866-1937) was born on 1 September 1866 in Sweden, near the village of Svanskog in Värmland, and emigrated to the United States in 1886. A native of Sweden, Mossberg went to work at the Iver Johnson Arms & Cycle Works in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. While at Iver Johnson, Mossberg supervised the manufacture of revolvers and shotguns, while contributing some of his own patented designs, including a top strap latching mechanism for the Iver Johnson Safety Revolver. When Mossberg left Iver Johnson, he went on to manage the small factory of the C.S. Shattuck Arms Co. in nearby Hatfield, Massachusetts, which manufactured single and double-barrel breechloading shotguns. From there he went to work for J. Stevens Arms & Tool Co., where he designed a small 4-shot novelty pistol which he patented in his name. Working out of an old barn behind his house, Mossberg and his sons made about 500 of these 4-shot pistols between 1907 and 1909. In 1914, Mossberg left Stevens, moving to New Haven, Connecticut in order to work for Marlin-Rockwell. In 1919, when Marlin-Rockwell went out of business (they primarily made machineguns, and World War I had just ended), the unemployed 53-year-old O.F. Mossberg and his two sons Iver and Harold started a new firearms company of their own, O.F. Mossberg & Sons. Renting a small loft on State Street in New Haven, the Mossbergs began work on a simple four-shot .22-caliber pocket pistol, the Brownie. Marketed largely to hunters and trappers for the humane dispatch of wounded or trapped animals, approximately 37,000 Brownie pistols were produced from 1920 to 1932.
Thanks to the Brownie pistol, the Mossbergs' firearms business grew steadily, and in 1921 the company purchased a building on Greene Street in New Haven, Connecticut. In 1922, the company introduced the first of a new line of .22 rimfire Mossberg rifles, a pump-action repeater designed by Arthur E. Savage, the son of the owner of Savage Arms Corp.
After building a third factory in New Haven, Connecticut in 1937, Mossberg continued to produce simple, economical firearms for the civilian market. O.F. Mossberg died in 1937, and the business continued under his son Harold.
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