<P> Business was slow into 1870, when Stevens occupied a converted grist mill and had just sixty employees . The 1873 Panic had a further negative impact on sales . By 1876 the company had recovered to the extent that it was then manufacturing twice the number of shotguns as it had been prior to that year . In 1883 they purchased the Massachusetts Arms Company which Joshua Stevens had helped found in 1850 . In 1886, the company was reorganized and incorporated as J. Stevens Arms & Tool Co . The business was able to grow steadily with tool manufacturing and sales now accounting for the bulk of the business output . </P> <P> Stevens and Taylor were bought out in 1896 by I.H. Page, who was one of the new partners and the bookkeeper . Page led the company to significant growth, such that by 1902 Stevens had 900 employees and was considered one of the top sporting firearms manufacturers in the world . In 1901, Stevens entered into a partnership with J. Frank Duryea to produce the Stevens - Duryea automobile manufactured at a separate facility also in Chicopee Falls, MA . In 1915, Stevens led the U.S. arms business in target and small game guns . </P> <P> On May 28, 1915 Stevens was purchased by New England Westinghouse, a division of Westinghouse Electric . New England Westinghouse was created specifically to fulfill a contract to produce 1.8 million Mosin - Nagant rifles for Czar Nicholas II of Russia for use in World War I. They needed a firearms manufacturing facility in order to accomplish this and chose Stevens . After the purchase they sold off the tool making division, halted production of Stevens - Duryea automobiles, and, on July 1, 1916, renamed the firearms division the J. Stevens Arms Company . When the Czar was deposed by the communists in 1917, New England Westinghouse was never paid and they fell into financial distress . They managed to sell most of the rifles to the U.S. Government and keep the Stevens firearms facility operational and did return to limited production of civilian firearms between 1917 - 1920 while looking for a buyer for Stevens . </P> <P> Stevens was purchased by the Savage Arms Company on April 1, 1920 with Stevens operating as a subsidiary of Savage but in a semi-independent status until 1942 . This merger made Savage the largest producer of arms in the United States at the time . After World War II they were renamed as Stevens Arms and sometimes identified as "Savage - Stevens" after 1948 . In 1960 Savage closed the Stevens Arms facilities in Chicopee Falls and moved Stevens production to various Savage manufacturing sites . In 1991 the Stevens name was discontinued but was resurrected in 1999 as the brand name for Savage's budget line of rifles and shotguns . </P>

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