I have an old single shot shotgun that i cannot find any inf...

I have an old single shot shotgun that i cannot find any info on. One side says AMERICA and the other side has patent dates. The dates have a three letter month followed by four digits. I assume the first two are the day and the last two are the year. If so the latest year listed was 08. Also there is an 08 stamped behind the trigger gaurd. I cannot find any markings denoting what guage it is. Any info would be greatly appriciated.

hello ,,around the turn of the century many inexpencive single shot shotguns were produced by a long list of companys for mail order firms,,most were good quality ,,and were sold in the thousands ,,unless it has a major manufactures name on it as a rule of thumb these are very low priced at around 100 bucks.. mabey a little more if extra clean with solid stocks ,,most ya see will have carcked stocks and finishes are usually worn to almost none on the metal,,not alot of collector intrest in old singles but they still do the job they were made to do if in good working condition and the lockup is solid

,,most of these old shotguns were 12 or 16 gaand were full chokes,,a test for a 12 ga that old timers used to do to see how full the choke was is to take a dime and insert it into the end of the barrel,,the dime should go into the barrel half way on a 12 ga full choke barrel,,if a dime goes over half way it's proably a 12 ga mod choke barrel,,but do not use this procedure as a way to determine the guage because 16 ga shotguns are very close in diameter so if in doubt have it checked out,,a 12 ga shell will not chamber in a 16 ga gun ,,but a 16 will chamber loosly in a 12 ga gun and results of fireing can be harmful to you and the gun,,also a 20 ga will go in a 16 ga chamber but a 16 will not go into a 20 ga so again ..if in doubt have it checked out..

bigcurt