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Travel notes.

Friday, November 19th, 2021

As you might have picked up from previous posts, Mike the Musicologist, myself, and some other friends who shall remain anonymous went up to Tulsa this past weekend for Wanenmacher’s Tulsa Arms Show. We generally try to go to every third one, but what with the Wuhan Flu et al, this is the first one we’ve been to since November of 2018.

I’m working on a longer post about some of the things I picked up during the show and around Tulsa, but I have to wait until one item arrives at my FFL. (On a related note, I am thinking more seriously about getting a C&R license. The problem is: I am already supposed to get one colonoscopy a year. I don’t need BATFE giving me a second one.)

A few things I noticed:

  • It didn’t take us as long to go through the show as it usually did. I felt like I had seen all the tables by about 2 PM on Sunday.
  • The reason is that it seemed there were fewer vendors. I think Wannemacher’s still sells all their tables, but it seemed like a lot of vendors may have purchased tables and then backed out for this round. Additionally, it seemed like a lot of vendors who were there decided to pack up their tables and close early: either they sold everything they’d brought, or just wanted to get on the road.
  • There were a lot of people selling AR pattern rifles and parts at the show. But as usual, almost all the ones I saw were not mass-production platforms (Bushmaster, S&W, etc.) but were from small builders. I really didn’t pay much attention to prices, because I wasn’t looking for a new AR pattern rifle. (I am kind of looking for a cheapish AR upper for my own personal Behind Every Blade of Grass gun (hattip: McThag), but it wasn’t a priority for me at this show.) Someone Who Isn’t Me did purchase an upper in .224 Valkyrie, but I didn’t note the price.
  • There were, as always, a lot of ammo vendors at the show. Which means ammo prices were competitive. I didn’t buy any ammo at the show. (I did pick up a box of .221 Fireball from Sports World and a box of 10mm Hornady Critical Duty from Dong’s Guns while we were roaming the city.) My Friends Who Are Not Me keep close track of ammo prices and did pick up some at the show for what they thought were good prices: 280 rounds of M-1 Garand specific .30-06 ammo for $1.25 a round (with ammo can and enbloc clips), 1000 rounds of .45 Auto for $.44 a round, 1000 rounds of 9mm for $.34 a round, and 1000 rounds of .380 for $.37 a round.
  • I saw a lot (relatively speaking) of older Smith and Wesson Model 48 revolvers for sale. It wasn’t like every other table had one, but I saw far more than I expected to see, even given the size of the show. The Model 48 is a K-frame revolver chambered in .22 Magnum. They are nice guns, especially the older ones. I was just surprised at how many I saw for sale. (No, I didn’t buy one: I already have one in 6″. It’s very nice.)
  • Pretty much all of our meals were good. We had the traditional German food at Siegi’s Sausage Factory, Thai food at Lanna Thai (“Lana!“), pretty good barbecue at Oklahoma Joe’s, excellent bulgogi at a hole in the wall called Gogi Gui Korean Grill, and a nice higher-end meal at Smoke Woodfire Grill. (Our usual higher end Sunday night meal place, The Chalkboard, is now only serving Sunday brunch.) We also had an excellent breakfast Monday morning at Bramble Breakfast and Bar in the Pearl District. (I recommend the Monte Carlo Benedict.) Also an excellent breakfast: Toast and Franklin’s on Main in Broken Arrow.

Posted in Endorsements, Food, Guns, Travel | Comments Closed

Quote of the day.

Thursday, October 28th, 2021

Perhaps the idea of what a suitable military handgun should be may change, and who knows, perhaps we may have a new .40-caliber cartridge to get the ‘sectional density’ considered necessary for stopping power and a powder charge that will permit the average man to learn quickly to do good shooting at practical pistol range. Such a cartridge with a recoil and muzzle blast not much greater than that of the .38 Special and less than that of the .38 Colt automatic cartridge would make the handgun far more effective, for after all a bullet that misses the intended mark is without value regardless of the energy it may have. The idea that a handgun is essentially a short-range arm is not at all new, even in military circles, but we seem to have attempted to increase the range beyond the practical limit with such cartridges as the .45 Automatic, with the result that the gun is decidedly difficult for the average man to shoot well.

—Pistol and Revolver Shooting, Walter F. Roper (1945).

(Well, we never got a “new .40-caliber cartridge” in a military arm – we went straight from .45 ACP to 9mm – but we did get the .40 S&W as a popular police caliber. I wonder what Roper would have thought of the cartridge: biographical information is hard to find, but I’m pretty sure he had passed on when the .40 S&W was introduced in 1990.)

(As a side note: I’m not as enthusiastic about this gun as other folks seem to be, but that’s because I already have a Hi-Power. If I was in the market, I’d think about it. Or if Springfield comes out with a .40 S&W or even a .357 SIG version of the SA-35, that might quicken my pulse a bit.)

Posted in Guns, History | 1 Comment »

Obit watch: October 22, 2021.

Friday, October 22nd, 2021

Halyna Hutchins, cinematographer. She was 42.

Information about this is still coming in, but the reports so far are that Ms. Hutchins was killed when Alec Baldwin discharged what is being described as a “prop firearm” on the set of a movie he was working on in New Mexico (“Rust”). The movie’s director, Joel Souza, was also injured: the last reports I saw were that he was in critical condition.

Deadline. NYT.

I don’t have a lot to say about this right now because I don’t think there’s enough information. I have no special fondness for Alec Baldwin (though I think he was good in “Hunt For Red October”) but I want to give him and everyone else involved the same benefit of the doubt I’d give anyone else in this situation.

Earl Old Person, chief of the Blackfeet Nation.

Beginning in 1954, when he was first elected to the Blackfeet Tribal Business Council, the tribe’s governing body, Chief Old Person positioned himself as a go-between linking his isolated, impoverished Native American community with the rest of the country and beyond. At his retirement from the council, in 2016, he was the longest-serving elected tribal leader in the country.
He was a regular witness at congressional hearings and a frequent guest of heads of state around the world. He drank tea with the shah of Iran and spoke at the 1988 Republican National Convention. He urged his tribe to be more entrepreneurial, and he persuaded government officials and venture capitalists to provide seed money for Blackfeet-owned businesses.
“His message is plain,” the magazine Nation’s Business wrote in 1981. “‘We don’t want your help, we want your business.’”

…

In the 1980s, the Department of the Interior began to lease land to oil and gas prospectors in the Badger-Two Medicine region, adjacent to the Blackfeet reservation, in northwestern Montana. The land is sacred to the Blackfeet, but an 1896 treaty ceded it to the federal government.
Chief Old Person insisted that the tribe had given only the land rights, not the mineral rights, and he helped lead a 40-year campaign to render the region off limits to outside interests (leaving open the possibility that the tribe might one day get into the energy business itself). Last year a court ruling closed the last of the leases on the land.
“Chief Old Person was a fierce advocate for the Blackfeet Nation and all of Indian Country for his entire life,” Senator Jon Tester, Democrat of Montana, said in a statement after the chief’s death. “The world is a better place because he was in it.”

Edited to add: current reports are that Joel Souza is out of the hospital. I wish him a speedy recovery.

Peter Scolari has passed away at 66. Since this is breaking, I’ll plan to do a more complete post tomorrow.

Edited to add 2: “How can a prop gun used on a movie set be deadly?” I feel like most of my readers know all this already, but this is a decent explainer for anybody who does not. Also, somebody tweaked me for not referencing Jon-Erik Hexum (which I didn’t do because it isn’t clear if the Baldwin situation is anything like the Hexum one, or the Brandon Lee one), so here’s your reference.

Edited to add 3:

The 28-year-old son of martial arts icon and legendary screen star Bruce Lee was killed in a freak accident on the set of “The Crow” on March 30, 1993, when fellow actor Michael Massee was supposed to shoot him at close range with a harmless pistol.
But when Massee fired the .44 Magnum revolver, the gunpowder in the blank cartridge ignited a bullet fragment that became embedded in the barrel — propelling it into Lee’s body about 15 feet away at the Carolco Studios in Wilmington, North Carolina, the Sun reported.

Posted in Guns, History, Movies, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#74 in a series)

Tuesday, October 5th, 2021

I would have missed this one if Mike the Musicologist hadn’t pointed it out to me.

Remember Lovely Warren, the soon to be former mayor of Rochester, New York? Indicted for criminal possession of a firearm and endangering the welfare of a child?

She’s going to be the former mayor sooner than expected: Ms. Warren took a plea.

Warren, 44, was readying Monday for what was expected to be a month-long trial on felony charges that she and two assistants violated campaign contribution limits, but she pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor, admitting that she knowingly exceeded the $8,557 limit, the Democrat & Chronicle reported.

Also taking pleas: “campaign treasurer Albert Jones Jr. and Rosiland Brooks-Harris, treasurer of political action committee Warren for a Strong Rochester”.

The campaign finance charges go back to an earlier indictment. But as part of the deal:

Warren, Jones and Brooks-Harris had faced up to four years in state prison if convicted on the felony charge, according to WHAM. But a judge sentenced all three to a year-long conditional discharge, meaning they could face additional penalties if they commit additional crimes during that period, the Democrat & Chronicle reported.

…

Warren’s plea deal Monday also resolved separate gun and child endangerment charges. In July, a grand jury indicted her and her estranged husband, Timothy Granison, with criminal possession of a firearm and endangering the welfare of a child and failure to lock or secure firearms in a dwelling, the newspaper reported.

So the way I’m reading this, she pled guilty to a single misdemeanor, if she keeps her nose clean for a year that goes away, and she gets to keep her law license.

But as part of the deal, she has to resign by December 1st. She’d already lost the Democratic primary, so she would have been out as of January 1st next year anyway: this just speeds things up a bit.

As best as I can tell, the charges against her “estranged husband”, the alleged dope dealer, are still pending.

Posted in Guns, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

More adventures in hoplobibliophila.

Sunday, October 3rd, 2021

The Smith and Wesson Collector’s Association Symposium has wrapped up.

I thought I’d stay over a day, relax, and kick around a bit. Unfortunately, a lot of the places I’d like to kick around are closed on Sundays. But my loss is your gain. At least if you like gun books.

Pistol and Revolver Shooting by Walter F. Roper. The colophon lists it as Macmillan, 1945, and “First Printing”, but the “Olympic Edition” on the cover makes me wonder. Maybe first printing in this edition?

Mr. Roper was a prominent gun guy and gun experimenter: here’s a short article by John Taffin from Guns magazine about him. Purchased for $40 from a fellow collector at the Symposium.

I would have sworn great and good FotB (and official firearms trainer of WCD) Karl Rehn of KR Training had reviewed this book on his blog. But if he did, I can’t find the review now.

Two of a perfect pair:

(Previously on Experiments of a Handgunner.)

I do have a copy of what I believe is Mr. Roper’s only other book, Smith and Wesson Hand Guns (with Roy McHenry) but I didn’t bring it on the road with me, and my copy is a reprint anyway.

Not exactly a gun book, but worth noting, in my humble opinion:

Smith and Wesson ties, tie bar, and tie pin. The tie bar and pin were purchased from one collector, the ties were purchased from another. I think they add that subtle touch of class when I’m wearing a suit. And I paid $25 for both ties (and another $10 for the bar and pin).

There was another very classy S&W tie in the auction on Saturday: sadly, it got bid beyond what I was willing to pay early, and I did not get a photo of it. You’ll have to trust me when I say this tie was about as subtle as a sledgehammer.

Final totally unrelated side note: of course there’s an Internet Movie Firearms Database entry for “Johnny Dangerously”. Just in case you were wondering what the “.88 Magnum” actually was.

Posted in Books, Guns, Hoplobibilophilia | Comments Closed

Obit watch: September 22, 2021.

Wednesday, September 22nd, 2021

Loral I Delaney, well known dog trainer…and legendary trapshooter.

An animal lover who as a young girl kept as pets every creature from raccoons to skunks, Delaney at age 5 headlined her first dog act in 1943 at the Northwest Sportshow in Minneapolis.
When she returned to the same stage a year later, the Minneapolis Tribune gushed, “The tiny daughter of Fred Armstrong put her two beautiful black Labradors through a retrieving act that literally brought down the house.”
In the nearly six decades that followed, Delaney and her dogs would appear at sports shows from New York to Los Angeles. She often drove herself, pulling a trailer full of Labradors, setters, pointers and Chesapeake Bay retrievers.

…

Trapshooting brought Delaney still wider acclaim. The first time she competed at the Minnesota State Trapshoot at age 19, she won the women’s title, breaking 197×200. At the same competition, she won the handicap in a shoot-off with five men.
A member of the National Trapshooting Hall of Fame, Delaney was named to every All-American Trapshooting team from 1966 to 1981, with the exception of one year. She won the Women’s World Flyer Championships four times. She shot on the U.S. Women’s Trapshooting Team before women’s trapshooting was included in the Olympics. And she and Chuck won the husband-wife U.S. trapshooting title four times.
Delaney also won seven Grand American World Trapshooting Championships, include five years consecutively, and was the only woman to win more than two in a row and more than four total.

Bennie Pete, leader of the New Orleans brass band, the Hot 8.

The Hot 8 began playing for tips on Bourbon Street and in Jackson Square, in the heart of the French Quarter. They performed outside a housing project in the Central City neighborhood, where people sat down with bags of crawfish and bottles of Abita beer to listen. Mr. Pete once found himself leading a jazz funeral for a dog.
“He was a popular dog for one of the popular musicians,” he told Esquire magazine in 2014, “and they threw a big second-line parade through the streets for him. They’d make a reason to party.”
By 2000, the Hot 8 had established itself as part of a vanguard of young brass bands that were upholding the jazz and funk traditions of New Orleans yet playing with a contemporary sound. The Hot 8’s repertoire included songs by the Specials and Marvin Gaye, and the band incorporated rap and hip-hop into its style. The musicians led second lines on Sundays for social aid and pleasure clubs; crowds formed at night to watch them play in bars in the Treme neighborhood.

Post Katrina, the Hot 8 led the effort to keep New Orleans’s musical heritage intact.

Two months later, the Hot 8 regrouped to lead the first jazz funeral in New Orleans after the storm. The band played with donated instruments, and members of the procession wore salvaged pieces of finery. The parade, which honored a celebrated chef, Austin Leslie, started at Pampy’s Creole Kitchen in the Seventh Ward before ambling to the former site of Chez Helene, where a sign greeted the marchers: “We won’t bow down. Save our soul.”
As despair weighed on the city, the Hot 8 began performing at evacuation shelters and emergency medical centers. They drove around in a van, stopping to jam for crowds until little second lines formed, before heading to another part of town. It wasn’t long before they became local heroes.
“Bennie wanted to play for these people to give them that New Orleans love that was missing,” his wife said. “He and the band got busy spreading the culture around.”

They were featured in Spike Lee’s “When the Levees Broke” and got a record deal.

Released in 2012, “The Life & Times Of …” was nominated for a Grammy Award as best regional roots music album. The group released “Tombstone,” a sister album also based on the theme of remembrance, the next year. The Hot 8 was also featured on a 2015 compilation album, “New Orleans Brass Bands: Through the Streets of the City,” on the Smithsonian’s Folkways label.
“Everything kind of worked,” Mr. Pete told Esquire. “Yeah, we are the Hot 8 who went through these things, but we’re still here, and this is who we are after the storm.”

…

But even as music returned to New Orleans after the storm, the Hot 8 endured more misfortune. Their snare drummer, Dinerral Shavers, was shot dead in his car in December 2006. It was only the latest in a series of tragedies for the band.
In 1996, the trumpet player Jacob Johnson was shot in the head at his home. In 2004, the trombonist Joseph Williams was killed in an encounter with the police. And just after Katrina, the trumpeter Terrell Batiste lost his legs in a road accident.

Mr. Pete was 45 years old. He died from complications of COVID and sarcoidosis, according to his family.

Willie Garson, from “Sex and the City”.

In addition to the “Sex and the City” movies, Mr. Garson worked with the Farrelly brothers in some of their films, including “Kingpin” (1996), “There’s Something About Mary” (1998) and “Fever Pitch” (2005).
He also played Lee Harvey Oswald three times, in the film “Ruby” (1992) and on the TV shows “Quantum Leap” and “MADtv.”

Saadi Yacef. He was a major figure in the Algerian revolt.

Mr. Yacef became involved in opposition movements while still a teenager and in 1954 joined the Front de Libération Nationale, the F.L.N., the leading nationalist organization during the war for independence. The war lasted from 1954 to 1962, ending with the country’s liberation from France.
He became the organization’s military chief in Algiers in 1956, ordering bombings and other guerrilla attacks until his arrest by French paratroopers the next year in the part of the city known as the casbah. He was sentenced to death.
“While I was in prison the executions were always done at dawn,” he told The Sunday Herald of Glasgow, Scotland, in 2007, “so when I saw the sun coming through the prison bars I knew I was going to live through another day. But I was very certain that I would be executed.”

Charles de Gaulle eventually freed him. And then he went on to act in Gillo Pontecorvo’s “The Battle of Algiers”.

With a script based on his book, he met with Mr. Pontecorvo, who was said to have been considering his own movie about the Algerian War, one that he hoped would star Paul Newman as a French paratrooper turned journalist. Mr. Yacef and his backers nixed that idea, and Mr. Pontecorvo found Mr. Yacef’s script propagandistic, but they continued to talk. Mr. Yacef arranged to bring Mr. Pontecorvo and his screenwriter, Franco Solinas, to Algiers for an extended stay so they could study up on the revolution, see locations where the fighting had occurred and meet people who had fought.
The resulting movie, filmed in Algeria with Mr. Yacef as a producer, had its premiere at the Venice Film Festival in 1966 and caused a sensation for its startling realism. Some scenes, especially of bombings, looked so authentic that the film in its initial showings was preceded by a disclaimer saying that no newsreel footage had been used.

I have “The Battle of Algiers” but haven’t watched it yet. It is a tough sell for the Saturday Night Movie Group, especially since I sort of forced them to watch another movie about the Algerian revolt (“Lost Command“, based on The Centurions by Jean Lartéguy).

Posted in Guns, History, Music, Obits | Comments Closed

Random gun crankery, some filler.

Thursday, September 9th, 2021

Two things that I have absolutely no use for but find oddly appealing. Both of these are kind of old, but I just discovered them in the past couple of days:

1. Lone Wolf shows them as “low stock”, but they do apparently still have 9×18 Makarov barrels for the Glock 42.

I actually learned about this by way of Lucky Gunner’s ammo tests, which I am familiar with, but was reviewing to find data about a specific caliber. I don’t know what advantage this would give me over .380 (ballistically, I think very little), and if I wanted something in 9×18, why wouldn’t I just go out and get a surplus gun? But the idea is just weird enough to turn my crank a little bit. And it is threaded for a suppressor…

2. Speaking of guns in .380 Auto…the Cimarron 1862 Pocket Navy. This is a newly manufactured gun, designed to emulate the look and feel of a 1862 Colt Pocket Navy, but set up as a cartridge-fired gun (instead of a black powder one), and chambered in .380 Auto.

Again, I have no use for this, and why would I carry one over my Glock 42? But it is another one of those things that’s so freaking weird, it turns the crank again. If I saw one turn up used at a good price, it would be tempting.

In other news, I am back from my vacation, as of Tuesday. The original plan was to attend the NRA Annual Meeting in Houston…but that was not to be. So instead, Mike the Musicologist and I spent a few days bumming around looking at gun shops, some in the area around Abilene.

I’ll probably write more about our adventures later, but since this is “random gun crankery”, I’ll mention Caroline Colt Company, which is a nice shop with a lot of quality guns, and a surprisingly good (for the times we are in) selection of ammo.

Thanks to great and good FotB (and official firearms trainer of WCD) Karl for introducing me to the work of the Snub Gun Study Group. As a confirmed snubby guy, I like this idea and wish to subscribe to their newsletter.

My snubbies. Let me show them to you.
Top: S&W 19-3 in .357 Magnum with Tyler T-grip.
Bottom: S&W Model 36 (no dash?) fitted with an Apex Tactical spring kit

(And yes, I consider the 2 1/2″ Model 19 to be a snub gun. As I recall, so did Ed Lovette in his book, The Snubby Revolver. No Amazon link because this was an old Paladin Press volume and prices are through the roof.)

In a rare combination of Smith and Wesson crankery and movie crankery, you can buy Indiana Jones’s S&W. On GunBroker. The “buy it now” price, though, is $5,000,000.00. Which is also the minimum bid. Just for comparison, the gun that killed Billy the Kid went for $6,030,312 not too long ago. (Hattip: The Firearm Blog.)

Lawrence sent over a note earlier this morning: David Chipman’s nomination to head BATFE is being withdrawn. I’d like to believe this is a good thing: maybe it is, but I’m worried the Biden administration is going to nominate someone who is even worse.

Posted in Books, Guns, Movies, Photography | Comments Closed

Random gun crankery, some filler.

Thursday, August 19th, 2021

Apologies for the slowdown in posting. I’ve been working on my paper for the 2022 MLA convention on “Sexual Politics in ‘Hobgoblins‘”.

(Lawrence pointed out an interesting fact: “Road Rash” in “Hobgoblins” is the same actor who played “Maynard” in “Pulp Fiction”.)

Anyway, a couple of interesting gun politics stories by way of the NYT:

San Francisco’s district attorney on Wednesday sued three online retailers for selling “ghost guns,” untraceable firearms that can be made from do-it-yourself kits, part of an intensifying nationwide effort to stem the flood of deadly homemade weapons into American cities.
In a civil complaint filed in California Superior Court, District Attorney Chesa Boudin accused the companies — G.S. Performance, BlackHawk Manufacturing Group and MDX Corporation — of marketing a range of products in the state that furnish buyers with parts and accessories that can be quickly assembled into a functional firearm.

Note the phrasing: “…parts and accessories that can be quickly assembled into a functional firearm”, not firearms themselves. I am not familiar with California law, so I don’t know what the status of 80% parts kits is there, nor do I know if any regulations against same would pass constitutional muster.

But it feels like this is one of those things that doesn’t matter, much like Remington and Sandy Hook: they might be able to beat the case legally, but the criminal DA of San Francisco can make it expensive enough to cripple or even bankrupt the vendors.

A new state law in Missouri that prevents local law enforcement from working with federal agents on gun cases is already hampering joint drug and weapons investigations, the Justice Department said in a court document filed Wednesday that was obtained by The New York Times.

Great and good FotB (and official firearms trainer of WCD) Karl put up a long – and, I think, fascinating – review on his blog of a vintage (1981) firearms/self defense guide from South Africa. I don’t recommend you follow the advice (and Karl does an excellent job of pointing out where it deviates from evolved practice today) but it is an interesting slice of history from a place only a few of us are familiar with.

Noted: the Smith and Wesson M&P 12. I’m kind of happy to see S&W back in the shotgun market, but I’m not wild about this particular gun.

Posted in Books, California Über Alles, Guns, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#70 in a series)

Tuesday, July 27th, 2021

Mike the Musicologist sent me a story that I missed.

The mayor of Rochester, New York, Lovely Warren, was indicted on July 16th. For the second time.

The first time was back in October for campaign finance violations.

This time? Would you believe…guns?

Both are charged with criminal possession of a firearm, a felony, and two counts each of endangering the welfare of a child and failure to lock/secure firearms in a dwelling, both misdemeanors; according to a statement from the Monroe County District Attorney’s Office. The couple have a 10-year-old daughter and, though separated, had continued living together.

The other half of the couple is Timothy Granison, her husband, who has his own set of problems. Specifically, he and five other people have been charged with “conspiracy to possess and distribute cocaine”.

Warren has maintained she did nothing wrong. She previously said she did not know about her husband’s activities, nor the handgun and semi-automatic rifle that police found inside the house they shared. She did not immediately respond to a text message Friday. And her attorney Joseph Damelio did not immediately return messages.

Mayor Warren lost the Democratic primary last month, so she will not be serving another term. She has not been implicated in the dope ring, either.

Noted:

John Jay College will host a panel discussion titled, “Mayors Against Illegal Guns: How are Mayors Taking Responsibility for Addressing Gun Violence in Their Cities?,” featuring Mayors Lovely Warren of Rochester, NY; and Stephanie Miner of Syracuse, NY; as well as Eric Cumberbatch, Executive Director of Mayor’s Office to Prevent Gun Violence , New York, NY. Bill Keller, Editor-in Chief of The Marshall Project, will serve as the moderator.

Guess that answers that question.

Posted in Guns, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

There is such a thing as taking gun crankery too far.

Wednesday, July 21st, 2021

When you are stealing stuff, you’ve gone too far. Especially if you are stealing stuff from Valley Forge.

In a bizarre, early-morning burglary in October 1971, a thief used a crowbar to break into an “unbreakable” case at Valley Forge National Historical Park and left with a rifle that dates back to the American Revolution.

The rifle was made by Johann Christian Oerter. This is the rifle.

Around the same time, other antique weapons were stolen from nearby museums — an 1830s Kentucky rifle stolen from the Historical Society of York County, a Colt Model 1861 percussion revolver taken from the American Swedish History Museum in FDR Park, a C. S. Pettengill double-action Army revolver removed from the Hershey Museum.

The rifle turned up again in July of 2018.

According to the plea agreement, [Thomas] Gavin sold two antique rifles, a trunk filled with more than 20 antique pistols, and a Native American silver conch belt at his home in Pottstown in July 2018 to antiques dealer Kelly Kinzle for $27,150.

Mr. Gavin pled guilty yesterday. I would have thought the statute of limitations would have run out on this, but the NYT reports he pled to one count of “disposing of an object of cultural heritage stolen from a museum”, which I guess is how they got around that. The charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years. (Insert obligatory note on maximum sentencing in the federal system, especially for a 78 year old man with no prior record as far as I can tell.)

A lawyer for Mr. Kinzle, the antiques dealer, to The New York Times in 2019 that his client discovered that he had bought a stolen weapon after he read about the theft of the Oerter rifle in a 1980 book by George Shumway, an expert on antique long rifles who died in 2011.

I can’t tell for sure, but I think this is a later edition of the Shumway book. (And this is the most current edition, with an added co-author.)

“I actually thought it was a reproduction,” Kinzle told the Inquirer in 2019. “My first inclination was that it had to be fake, because the real gun isn’t going to show up in a barn in today’s world. Things like that are already in collections.”

…

The rifle is one of just two dated and signed by Oerter known to still exist. The other was given to future King George IV in the early 1800s by a British cavalry officer who served in the war. It’s housed in the Royal Collection at Windsor Castle.

Posted in Guns, Law | 1 Comment »

Bagatelle (#38 (?) in a series).

Wednesday, June 23rd, 2021

Flashback:

So I was at my local gun shop over the weekend…and they actually had a C96 in the display case for sale. I kid you not: it was the first one I’ve ever seen in the wild.

It even came with the “holster”. Really. That’s what they said. They were very careful about not calling it a “shoulder stock”. It was a “holster”. (They were also very clear that: once you got it home, what you did with the “holster” was your own damn business.)

The previous owner had even thrown in a box of ammo and some empty brass. The whole kit looked to be in pretty good shape (though I believe the clerk said the hammer had been replaced with a later period hammer, so it wasn’t quite all matching).

They were (are?) asking a mere $1,800 for it. Which is more than I’m willing to shell out right now. But if a Broomhandle Mauser is your cup of tea for a carry gun, feel free to drop me a line privately and I’ll hook you up with the shop.

Edited to add 6/24: Fun fact, which I just had the chance to research today. While a pistol with a shoulder stock is technically considered a short barrelled rifle (SBR) and falls under the National Firearms Act of 1934 regulations, there are certain specific items – “such as original semiautomatic Mauser “Broomhandles” and Lugers” – that are considered “collectors’ items” and are not subject to the NFA.

You can find the complete lists here, if you are that curious.

Posted in Bagatelle, Guns, Holsters | Comments Closed

Random gun crankery, some filler.

Wednesday, June 16th, 2021

This is a little newer than I usually like to use, and I have not watched all of it yet. But I have linked to DeviantOllam before, I trust his content, and I don’t think he’s quite as popular in the gun community as hickok45 or Forgotten Weapons…

“Gun Storage: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Gun Safes and Locks”.

From the wonderful folks at Wilson Combat: “Gun Guys Ep. 34 with Bill and Ken”. This time, they discuss “Elmer Keith, the .44 Magnum, and the .357”. I like this because it serves as a decent introduction to Elmer Keith (who I have touched on before) for those folks who are interested in guns, but came after the Elmer Keith era.

Jerry Miculek shoots his S&W 5906 Performance Center pistol (which was apparently an overrun from a contract with the Mexican Special Forces). Bonus: 9MM Incendiary ammo.

I watched this over the weekend (it popped up in my recommendations). Then I started looking at 5906 pistols on GunBroker…

Random acts of hoplobiblophilia:

Modern Gunsmithing by Clyde Baker. This is only “fair” at best, and yes, that is a crappy dust jacket. But this is one of those original Samworth/Small-Arms Technical Publishing Company editions that are hard to find. Ran across this at HPB, and paid what I think is about the same price as I would have paid on ABEBooks.

One of the odd things about Samworth’s books is that he didn’t use a printers key, so it’s hard to tell what printing one of his books is. You have to rely on internal clues, like the advertising pages in the back of the book: while the original copyright is 1933, the advertising page in the back is dated September 1950, and includes some SATPCO post-WWII books.

Posted in Books, Guns, Hoplobibilophilia | 2 Comments »

Obit watch: June 9, 2021 (supplemental).

Wednesday, June 9th, 2021

Lawrence tipped me off to this: Chip McCormick, who I think can fairly be described as the father of the modern 1911.

Shooting Illustrated has a good article:

Before CMC (Chip McCormick Custom), there was no such thing as the now ubiquitous drop-in AR-15 trigger. Gunsmiths would put together a trigger with parts, often from a kit. McCormick created a single-unit trigger that installs in minutes; literally a “drop in.” Of course easy installation was not good enough for McCormick, he made it crisp, clean, with no creep….Match grade. Now dozens of imitators crowd the market, the market created by Chip McCormick.
Before Kimber, the 1911 had to be fitted from oversize parts. If you saw one in the gun store, it was usually a basic government model that the owner would have to customize. McCormick conceived of the “spec” 1911 with all parts being within specific tolerances so the gun could be assembled, instead of fitted. McCormick approached several companies, but they turned him away. Kimber’s Leslie Edelman saw the potential and quickly struck a deal for Chip to create a production gun. Unlike anything else on the market, it was fully accessorized with beavertail grip safety, extended slide release and ambidextrous thumb safeties. Not only was the Kimber handgun line born, but so was a new way of building the 1911. Now the production 1911 is the industry standard, as are fully accessorized guns.

…

While it is inarguable that McCormick left an indelible mark on the world of guns, let us also remember the manner in which he conducted himself. When he was rolling out the RPM magazine at SHOT Show, I worked in his booth and had the opportunity to observe him. Whether it was an industry titan, a fan of his products, or a competitor from his shooting days, they were all greeted like royalty. His warmth and welcoming nature was beautiful to watch.

…

The legacy that Chip McCormick leaves behind is truly enormous. It is hard to imagine anyone who has accomplished as much as he did. All of this done with honor, honesty and class.

I never had the pleasure of meeting Mr. McCormick (though I swear by his 1911 magazines) but great and good friend of the blog (and official firearms trainer of WCD) Karl shot with him, and has a post up on Facebook:

During the 1990s, Austin was a hotbed of firearms development. If you follow the roots of the tree starting with CMC and STI, they lead to many other companies like Dawson Precision, LaRue, KR Training, ART Enterprises, Competition DVD, NTaylor, and the Ben Stoeger Pro Shop, just to name a few.

Posted in 1911, Guns, Obits | Comments Closed

The stupid, it burns…

Thursday, June 3rd, 2021

Florida Man, Florida Man…

Police say a 10-year-old boy approached his father with an unusual request: Could he take him to do a drive-by shooting in Opa-locka with a paint gun? The father, 26-year-old Michael Williams, agreed, detectives say.

Cutting to the chase, the homeowner returned fire. With a real gun. The 10-year-old was injured, and the dad is charged with “child neglect with great bodily harm”.

If the boy is 10, that would make the dad 16 when he had the child. Which may indicate something…

Bonus:

The boy suffered a further injury after losing his balance and getting run over by the van, according to the police report.

Florida Man, Florida Man…

A judge has rejected the “stand your ground” defense of a Florida man who said he beat an iguana to death only after it attacked him, biting him on the arm.

…

Prosecutors say Patterson “savagely beat, tormented, tortured, and killed” the 3-foot (1-meter) iguana in a half-hour attack caught on surveillance video. Prosecutor Alexandra Dorman said that “at no time was the iguana posing any real threat” to Patterson last September and he “was not justified in his actions when he kicked this defenseless animal at least 17 times causing its death.”
Animal control officials said Patterson tormented the animal, which is why it bit him on the arm, causing a wound that required 22 staples to close. Under state law, people are allowed to kill iguanas, an invasive species, in a quick and humane manner. A necropsy, though, showed the iguana had a lacerated liver, broken pelvis and internal bleeding, which were “painful and terrifying” injuries, prosecutors contend.
But Patterson’s public defender, Frank Vasconcelos, wrote that the iguana was the aggressor when it “leaned forward with its mouth wide open and showing its sharp teeth, in a threatening manner” and attacked Patterson. Bleeding from his bite, Patterson “kicked the iguana as far as he could,” Vasconcelos said.

Florida Woman, Florida Woman…

A woman who was missing for three weeks and then rescued from a Florida storm drain found herself in another underground tunnel system in Texas over the weekend, according to media reports.

Paraphrasing someone: “To fall into one storm drain may be regarded as misfortune, to fall into a second storm drain looks like carelessness.”

Houston Woman, Houston Woman…

A Texas mother has been charged after police say she accidentally shot her 5-year-old son while firing multiple times at a dog running loose in a Houston neighborhood over the weekend.

The boy was hit by a ricochet. His injuries are “not expected to be life-threatening”.

Posted in Guns, Law, Lizards, Reptiles, Stupid | 1 Comment »

Things I did not know. (#8 in a series)

Wednesday, June 2nd, 2021

There is a caliber called – I kid you not – “22 Wampus Kitty”.

No, there isn’t a Wikipedia entry for it, which makes it an ideal hipster caliber for varmint hunting. (“I shoot gophers with a rifle chambered in 22 Wampus Kitty. It’s a pretty obscure caliber. You’ve probably never heard of it.”)

I found out about this because MidwayUSA actually lists reloading dies for it.

I’m slightly tempted to get something chambered in 22 Wampus Kitty, but: not only would I have to reload it, the process of reloading is complicated.

22 Wampus kitty cases are formed by necking down a 243 Winchester case (which everyone makes) to take 22 calibre projectiles (front picture), and then blow out to “Ackley” body taper and shoulder angle (rear picture).

I’ll stick with .221 Remington Fireball for my hipster cartridge needs, thank you very much.

Posted in Guns | Comments Closed

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