Some of us fudds were around when Nosler was pushing sales of their brand new partition bullet. In spite of what some of you great "non fudds" think, there were some mighty fine bullets made in the past, one as early as 1925, which I will comment on later. But in the years following WW2 there were many quality bullets coming on the market, including the famous Nosler, which was able to survive the years. I always remember Jack O'Connor getting annoyed at all the hype about new bullets and in his writings in Outdoor Life magazine he commented on it. He stated the facts we hear today, about deep penetration, expansion and maintaining weight, then he made the following remark. Something like, "That's all a bullet can do. It can not sing Yankee Doodle or dance a jig."
When Fred Barnes restarted his bullet making after WW2 he came up with a dandy. For jackets he used copper tubing, exactly the same he stated, as you can buy in a hardware store, bonded a lead core and shaped them. My brother bought quite a lot of these for his 30-06 in 150 grain weight and 200 grain weight. I shot moose with each of the bullet weights and have often said I thought the 150 grain gave the quickest, one shot kills on moose, of any bullet I had used. Placement didn't have to be perfect either. I had the 150s in my 30-06 when I was pussy footing through the bush in moose country. A bull jumped up in front of me, from where he had been bedded down. He then ran straight away with his head too low to hit. I aimed right at his tail and let fly. The bull didn't get thirty feet until he collapsed. Those bullets mushroomed, then maintained nearly all their weight.
I still have a very few of the Barnes 200 grain, certainly a premium bullet.
Among the other top bullets available were the German wasp waist, highly touted by the European hunters who were coming into BC at that time.
Herters, so well known for their low priced, but actually quite good quality, line of every thing, came up with some premium bullets, based on the idea of the wasp waist, which were not cheap, but were a very high quality, premium bullet.
Then there was our own CIL, Dominion brand Copper Point expanding, which they loaded into their factory loads, as well as selling the bullets to hand loaders. I shot quite a few moose with those also and I have often said that I thought they were better than the much heralded Nosler partition. My thoughts on this were reinforced when, many years later I read the books of Jack Beaudrau, such as Crazy Man's Creek and Grizzly Bear Mountain. He lived in great grizzly country out Sinclair Mills way and has probably shot more grizzly bears than any other person alive today. He stated in his grizzly book that he used a 30-06 and Dominion factory loaded 180 grain Copper Point Expanding bullets, exclusively. He stated he didn't think there was a better bullet made.
In 1975, Jack O'Connor wrote a lengthy article in Outdoor Life, on the fiftieth anniversary of the 270 calibre rifle. I have the magazine and here is a copy of a bit of the article.
