Gary - Thanks for the photos - that's a great rifle! Plain but looks like excellent work and i love the lines of it.
For some reason, I've never been drawn to what I would call "fancy" rifles. I love the good old "Southern" rifles that were just "plain honest rifles" - made to be a functional tool. I love looking at them!
Years ago, when I was going to Friendship on a regular basis, I always made it a point to stop at Myron Carlson's booth and usually ended up spending a couple of hours with him just "jawing". Both he and his wife were wonderful people. I always enjoyed seeing what Myron was working on - his Bean rifles were a thing of beauty - plain, graceful and just sort of "melted" into your arms. I loved his "miniature" Beans as well. He made some beautiful hand forged furniture for Beans and Virginia rifles. I bought a set of his hand forged furniture for a Virginia Rifle I was building. I got the rifle done, (a flintier) shot it a few times and then took it to a gun show just for display. A guy came along and made an offer I couldn't refuse - and I regret it now. I was going to pick up a couple of sets of Myron's Bean rifle furniture - then he got sick and passed away. A very fine gentleman.
Will be interesting to hear what else you find out on this rifle. I think it's a great example!