Once Upon A Time... in 1959
click the pictures to enlarge |
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There
once was a very enthusiastic young
gun
connoisseur named Cholly Steen, III. His passion for the industry began an incredible
collection of guns, parts and accessories - so many that he had to find places to
put everything. He began to store
everything he had way up high in the tower of his castle, or rather the attic of his
apartment. It wasn't long before he decided he needed a name for his
collection, thus the "Steen Armament Research Company" was born, better
known now as SARCO, INC. |
The
attic was a fine place to store all his wonderful gun parts, but it was no
easy feat as there were many stairs to climb. As no one really wants to
carry everything to the attic all the time, he made a habit of dropping
boxes off where ever he was going at the moment. Needless to say, there was
a trail of parts that led down the halls and step by step up each floor like
little bread crumbs, telling a tale of where he had been
that day. |
As you can see, the castle was quite
large and eventually was full of treasures. |
It wasn't long before the boxes took
over and out grew the attic. Luckily, Cholly was able to take over the
barn/garage next door. |
The
more parts he collected, the more he had to cram.
There were parts in every nook and cranny. This was officially his SARCO # 2. Pretty
soon, this too was busting at the seams. Cholly decided he really needed to
find something larger for all his hard work. |
With a
stroke of luck, the building
down the street became available and quickly became SARCO # 3. Yet again, he kept
collecting and eventually, you guessed it, out grew this building too. |
With
an even bigger stroke of luck, the building around the corner was now
obtainable!
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He
snatched it up and began to fill it with everything he had. Years and
years... and years... of parts had SARCO # 4 in the making - and 50 years
later, it has
been able to hold a lot! |
But
even the best eventually needs help, so Cholly found himself a warehouse to
catch the parts that spilled out; sort of a SARCO # 4.5, if
you will. |

And there you are. A wonderful journey of expansion
from the ground up - a passionate interest that lead from an incredible
collection to "one
of the world’s largest wholesale and retail suppliers of firearms, firearms
parts, accessories, and associated material." |
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So what does a 50-year collection of
guns, gun parts and accessories look like anyway?
It may be hard to imagine. Go ahead and take a look. Perhaps you'll see why
he had to move out of the attic!
And when Cholly advertises "Just Found In The Warehouse", you'll see he
wasn't kidding! |
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See? Dreams do come true!
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