Forgotten Weapons
Published 7 Jan 2026I am joined today by Val Forgett III of Navy Arms for the first in a series of videos telling some of his stories form growing up in the golden age of surplus, with a father who was one of the largest arms dealers in the US. Today, we are talking about how his father ended up owning the W.W. Greener company for five days, and taking a look at a sniper rifle from the Greener museum collection — a .280 Ross fitted with a Zeiss optic used by Greener’s nephew to significant effect in the First World War.
Minor correction: The guns Val still has were duplicates for Edward VII, not Edward VI.
In addition, Mr Bailey’s story has a happy ending. Val’s father gave him the machine tools from the Greener shop and prepaid for six months lease on a nearby building for him to start his own business. He eventually partnered with a former Greener employee named Leonard Onions and they formed Bailons Gunmakers Ltd, which was in business for many years.
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May 30, 2026
Buying W.W. Greener: Tales from the Golden Age of Surplus
QotD: Winnipeg
Winnipeg is in the geographic centre of Canada and perhaps our cultural centre in terms of defining what is really Canadian — not just because it’s called Winterpeg. Vancouver culturally associates with San Francisco or Seattle, Calgary with Dallas, Toronto with New York, and Montreal with Paris.
But Winnipeg is a place unto itself, a place that reflects the vast space and isolation one feels in countless Canadian communities from the Maritimes to northern Ontario to the interior of B.C.
In such communities, the glue is neighbourliness, a thirst to find a middle ground, a place where everyone has something in common.
David Lawrason, “Canada’s Middle Ground”, Wine Access, September, 2005.
