The grand old Mossberg 500, along with the immortal 870 Remington, is one of the great American sporting arms. I’ve often said, if you can have only one gun, make it a 12-gauge pump shotgun, and it’s hard to go wrong with either of these.
A 12-gauge pump, after all, is not only well-nigh indestructible, but it’s fairly easy to shoot well, will digest a wide range of ammo, and at close ranges, hits like a runaway truck. Ammo is available almost anywhere.
The Mossberg, as well, is endlessly accessorizeable. The Remington is, too, but this piece is about the Mossberg, which I have long thought of as the “AK of American shotguns.” It’s not the prettiest, it’s not the fanciest, but it will keep on shooting and shooting and shooting, in almost any conditions.
Here’s what’s great about the grand old Mossberg 500.
The History
I’ve already described the history of the company, the Mossberg founder, and the origins of the gun:
See Also: Sunday Gun Day Vol. II Ep. XXIX - A Man Named Mossberg
In that piece, I wrote:
The crowning achievement of Mossberg is certainly the Model 500, designed by Mossberg engineer Carl Benson. The new gun was introduced in August of 1961, making the Model 500 two months older than me. It was a pretty standard pump-gun design but for two things: A forged aluminum receiver and a locking lug on the bolt that locked into a steel extension on the barrel. That barrel could be removed in a manner of seconds and replaced with another, making the Model 500 not only affordable, light, and reliable, but also versatile.
Marketed at an entry-level price for entry-level shooters, the 500 rapidly took off. To date, over 10 million have been built, and they have been used not only by hunters and recreational shooters but also by police departments and the military, most often in the extended-magazine Model 590 version. The Model 500 is, like the AR-15, endlessly accessorizeable; not only are the barrels easily and quickly exchanged, but there are huge varieties of barrels, stocks, fore-ends, optical mounts, heat shields, and even bayonet lugs available, all of which contributes to the gun’s popularity.
But the guns–ah, the guns themselves, again, the famous Mossberg versatility comes in even at the factory, before accessories are added.
The Guns
The variety Mossberg offers today is bewildering. Here are a few examples:
The entire 590 series, with the 500 action but with an extended magazine tube holding up to ten rounds of 2 ¾” 12-gauge shells – or with the ability to take a 10-round box magazine. These have mostly plastic furniture with more Picatinny rails than the entire United States Marine Corps. There are even 590 “Retrograde” versions, which look to have pretty decent wood stocks and forearms.
There are camouflage guns intended for turkey hunters and waterfowlers, both in the 500 series and in the lengthened 835 “Ulti-Mag” series that will accept the big 3 ½” Roman candles. There are combo guns that come in a variety of finishes with both a slug barrel and a bird barrel. There are youth-model guns with stocks that can be shortened or lengthened, called the “Bantam” series. There is also a field-grade Model 500 Retrograde, again with what looks like decent wood furniture.
The box-magazine 590, for some reason, I find intriguing. I may have to convince my wife that I need one to play around with for a while, just to see if I like the setup.
And, finally, there’s the base-model “Maverick” 88 guns, built with a few manufacturing shortcuts, like only one action bar instead of two. These are real entry-level guns, selling for less than the regular 500s, but everyone I know who has one is happy with it. Mossberg originally sold guns like this under the “New Haven” label, which is what my 20-gauge gun is, and it’s worked reliably for over half a century.
As I’ve mentioned before, I have two Mossberg pump guns: The aforementioned Model 600 “New Haven” 20-gauge that my parents gave me for my 14th birthday, and the Model 500 12-gauge I bought when I was 18. They both still function perfectly. The 20 doesn’t see much use these days, but I can’t part with it; it was, after all, a gift from my parents. The 12, I’m willing to bet, has had ten thousand rounds run through it, and it works as good as new.
Bear in mind that much of this also applies to the immortal 870, which I’ve already described.
See Also: Sunday Gun Day Vol. II Ep. XXI - The Immortal 870
The Accessories
One of the better aspects of the Mossberg 500 is how easy it is to swap barrels. I have three barrels for my old 500 that I’ve had since 1980: A 28” bird barrel with choke tubes, a 24” rifle-sighted slug barrel, and an 18” cylinder-bore “riot” barrel. That last one is the barrel that lives on the gun more or less permanently these days, as that 500, after all these years, is still the gun I keep handy around the place, its magazine full of mil-spec 00 buckshot loads for whatever trouble may come around.
There are endless accessories available. Most of the Tacticool Mossbergs come with a wealth of Picatinny rails, and some even have bayonet lugs, enabling them to mount the standard M7 bayonet intended for the M-16 series rifles. No matter what your fancy is – lights, lasers, bayonets, chainsaws, you can probably mount one on your Mossberg. Want a folding or telescoping stock? No problem. A forearm with a light built in? I’ve seen them. And that’s not even getting into the wild variety of barrels available, from bird-hunting tubes to law-enforcement breaching barrels.
The Best Part
You can still get all this stuff today. Pump shotguns are available in a lot of places that aren’t necessarily really gun-friendly. And it seems like more and more accessories are available all the time. Where new Mossbergs are concerned, you can still get them, from wood-stocked bird guns with internal choke tubes to full-on Tacticool, with heat shields, Picatinny rails on every available surface, and even bayonet lugs. There’s also no end to the things you can put on those Picatinny rails, from lights and lasers to the infamous chainsaw bayonet. Yes, most places, even today, you can have this cake and eat it, too.
It's not the prettiest, and it’s not the fanciest, the Mossberg 500. But it’s among the best. And the greatest thing? Mossberg is still an American, family-owned business. No Chinese junk here. Just good old American steel.
You just don’t get much better than that.
