Christman Jr., David

Christman is a hunting enthusiast who got into gunmaking in his 30s. What attracted him?

“I was too poor to buy a factory gun, so I built one,” he says. “That’s the truth! Necessity is the mother of invention. Life’s too short to hunt with an ugly gun. You know, I tell guys, ‘when you’re sitting out there in your deer stand, you’re gonna look at your gun a whole lot more than you’re gonna look at the deer’!”

Christman starts as most craftspeople who work with wood do: with a nice wood blank. He prefers English walnut (“it’s just the prettiest”), but will work with whatever wood his client requests. Christman prefers a clean, classic look to the stocks he builds, emphasizing the natural beauty of the wood and embellishing only very simply using checkering techniques.