^* New England had more than its fair share of gunsmiths, principally because it was the first part of the continent to be thickly settled by colonists, and because there was ample water, and waterfalls, to provide power for such machinery as was needed to work primitive lathes and turning devices. Although modeled on European guns, New England weapons were often made with longer-than-usual barrels, a feature that derived from the colonists’ trade with the local Indians. The main trade goods the Indians could offer were beaver skins, and it became customary for traders to exchange a musket for a pile of beaver pelts as tall as the gun was long. (One of the oldest private gun-making firms that made such weapons was that of the Robbins and Lawrence Company in Windsor, Vermont, its buildings finely preserved and lately turned into the American Precision Museum.)