Iver Johnson Arms
Iver Johnson Arms grips
Iver Johnson Arms was founded in 1871 in Worcester, Massachusetts, by Norwegian immigrant Iver Johnson (born 1841 in Nordfjord, Norway) and gunsmith Martin Bye as Johnson Bye & Company. Johnson, who immigrated in 1863 during the Civil War and apprenticed as a gunsmith in Bergen, Norway, merged operations to produce affordable revolvers and firearms
In 1883, Johnson bought out Bye's share, renaming it Iver Johnson & Company. The firm relocated to Fitchburg, Massachusetts, in 1891 for larger facilities, adding bicycles and adopting the name Iver Johnson's Arms & Cycle Works in 1894 (with the iconic owl-head logo on grips from ~1890)
Iver died of tuberculosis in 1895; his sons Frederick, John Lovell, and Walter took over. The company became renowned for inexpensive, reliable pocket revolvers like the Safety Automatic line (introduced 1904 with "Hammer the hammer" slogan promoting drop-safe hammer-block safety and frame-mounted firing pin)
Notable for high-volume production of budget .22, .32, and .38 S&W revolvers (serving the "Saturday Night Special" market alongside H&R and Hopkins & Allen), Iver Johnson also made shotguns and briefly motorcycles (1907–1916). One infamous event: assassin Leon Czolgosz used an Iver Johnson .32 Safety Automatic to shoot President William McKinley in 1901
The company focused on firearms post-WWI, continuing until liquidation in 1993. The brand was later revived under new ownership (now producing shotguns in Turkey), preserving its legacy of accessible, innovative American firearms
