The Screaming hot Marlin 336SC Zipper of yesteryear
If you are a predator or varmint hunter, odds are the thought of a 50-ish grain .22 caliber bullet with a velocity of over 3200 feet per second would get your attention. Well the thing is, the round itself has existed for almost a century as the .219 Zipper. Furthermore, there is a classic JM rifle that chambered it and it’s considered one of the “holy grails” of modern Marlin lever guns.
As explained by Gun Digest’s Dan Sheeler, the .219 Zipper was birthed out into the world in 1936 as an aberration of the .22 Savage High Power, which in itself was but a necked-down .25-35 WCF with a smaller bullet. Regardless of the parentage, imagine a .30-30 case with a .223 bullet wedged on top and you have the general idea. This created one heck of a fast round, leaving the .22 Hornet in the dust and predating the .17HMR of today by a couple generations.
The round proved hyper-accurate and capable of felling most varmint and predator species as well as medium sized game such as whitetail with proper shot placement. Although it sounds like it should have been used in heavy barreled bolt action and single shot varminteer pieces, only two guns chambered this round– and both were lever actions. First was the Winchester 64 for a decade (Winnie helped create the cartridge) and the second was the Marlin.
By 1954, the Zipper was considered a dying round. Its not that it wasn’t popular. People who had the old ’64s chambered in it loved it. However there was a ton of competition from new rounds like the .222 Remington, .218 Bee and others that duplicated its performance.
Nevertheless, Marlin breathed new life into the old round and chambered one of its 1895-actioned Model 336 guns for the sharpshooting little cartridge.
