–McThag
(So, about that Super Redhawk in .22 Hornet…)
Archive for the ‘Guns’ Category
Quote of the day.
Monday, December 11th, 2023Quote of the day.
Saturday, December 9th, 2023[David Mamet] was once “phone pals” with legendary director Stanley Kubrick for the briefest of times, for instance. “He called me from his home in England. We spoke for two afternoons, mostly about guns,” he recalls.
“He was a competitive pistol shot; I was too. I of course wanted to steer the conversation to film gossip, but firearms, like aviation and sexual dish among their aficionados, trump all.”
(I knew that Mamet was a shooter, and I’d love to sit down and talk guns with him sometime. I had no idea that Kubrick was also a shooter. And frankly, I have all sorts of questions about that, mostly about how you can be a competitive pistol shot in England. I suspect money helps a lot.)
Very short random gun crankery.
Thursday, December 7th, 2023Obit watch: December 3, 2023.
Sunday, December 3rd, 2023Tim Dorsey, mystery author. Obit from The Rap Sheet.
I’ve never read any of his books, but he seems to be generally classified as a member of the Florida School of Wackos genre. (See also: Carl Hiaasen, Dave Barry).
Long before Florida Man became the Sunshine State’s unofficial mascot, there was Serge A. Storms, the antihero at the heart of Mr. Dorsey’s 26 novels, beginning with “Florida Roadkill” in 1999.
Brilliant and high-strung, Serge is also a serial killer who channels his homicidal urges into taking out various baddies he encounters during a series of improbable adventures around Florida. He usually rolls in the company of Coleman, his semi-lucid friend whose proficiency with various narcotics is so well known that strangers ask him for autographs.
The Firearm Blog coverage of the Remington Ilion shutdown. Per their story, Model 700 production had already shifted to Georgia earlier this year.
Obit watch: December 1, 2023.
Friday, December 1st, 2023Sandra Day O’Connor, a good El Paso girl (thanks, Rich!). WP.
You know who writes really good obits? Murray Newman writes really good obits, thought it probably helps that his obits are for people he knew personally. Anyway, he put up another excellent one for former Harris County DA Chuck Rosenthal, who passed away November 23rd. I have not seen this reported elsewhere.
The Remington plant in Ilion, New York. My brother forwarded some tweets yesterday, and Mike the Musicologist found press coverage, but I prefer the Outdoor Life link.
The Ilion plant had been making guns since 1828. I have seen references (but can’t back them up) to this being the oldest continuously operating manufacturing plant making the same product in the United States. At the time of the announcement, they were making the Remington 870 shotgun and the Model 700 bolt-action rifle.
Remington (well, the new “RemArms, LLC”, which is one of the parts that emerged from bankruptcy) is moving all of their production to their new facilities in Georgia, and plans to shut down the plant in March of next year. However, the tweets my brother sent over were from people who said they’d already been laid off.
Frankly, this doesn’t surprise me, though I feel bad for the people who get fired right before Christmas. (Been there, done that, got the t-shirt.) New York is consistently hostile to firearms, so moving everything out of there seems like a good decision. It also sounds like a lot of the equipment is old and needs replacement or refurbishment. I’m surprised that they apparently aren’t offering Ilion employees jobs and relocation allowances to move to Georgia, but the linked article says the employees were represented by the United Mine Workers of America. That could have been another factor: move to Georgia and get cheap non-union labor. (Hi, Lawrence!)
It should be interesting to watch this play out. I’m wondering if Remington also plans to move their museum to Georgia as well.
What to do? What. To. Do?
Friday, November 17th, 2023I could do three, maybe four, very short posts covering and updating about various news items.
Or I could do one post hitting all of those items, even though it wouldn’t be as organized as doing multiple posts. But it’d just be one post, and maybe slightly more substantial. So one post it is.
Obit watch: A.S. Byatt, noted British author (Possession).
George Brown, drummer for Kool & the Gang.
Non-flaming non-hyenas watch: Mike the Musicologist sent over a link (but I’m using the Post‘s instead) stating that the gun charges against NYC Councilwoman Inna Vernikov are going to be dropped. Turns out that her gun was unloaded and also missing the recoil spring assembly, so it couldn’t be fired.
This actually makes me feel less sympathetic to her. It seems like she was carrying the gun as a prop, not because she felt a need for protection. And that doesn’t strike me as being very smart.
Firings watch: Chris Partridge, linebackers coach at the University of Michigan. This does seem to be tied to the ongoing scandal.
There are somewhat more than hints in that article and this one that UMich has found out some things about what’s been going on that are causing tsuris.
Trip report: Tulsa, OK.
Thursday, November 16th, 2023So Mike the Musicologist and I went back to Tulsa for the Wanenmacher’s Tulsa Arms Show again last week. Left Wednesday, got back this past Monday night.
I don’t want to say it was a bad trip: it wasn’t, but it did seem kind of ill-fated from the start. No broken friendships, no car damage (though MtM did get a little love tap from behind on a San Antonio freeway – no harm done), no lost money, no hotel problems.
But I took the Tuesday off to pack, and instead of things going smoothly, it was a parade of petty annoyances, including a dryer that broke while I was doing laundry. (The laundromat on Hudson Bend near Lakeway is the grungiest one I’ve ever seen in my life.)
Then, once we got to Tulsa, I felt a little off my feed much of the trip. It seemed like I was having constant mild allergic reactions to something: watery nose, itchy skin, scratchy throat, etc. It was low level and didn’t keep me from enjoying myself, but it was enough to bother me.
(We’ve taken to getting a VRBO when we go, instead of a hotel room. That generally works out okay, though MtM often has criticism of the interior design of the homes we get.)
I didn’t buy any guns at the show. I did find a few I liked, including a S&W Model 53 with the 8 3/8″ barrel. But the seller wanted $2,300, which was more than I was willing to pay. I planned to go back before the show ended on Sunday and see if he’d take a lower offer, but when we got there at 2 PM (show closes at 4 PM on Sunday) he’d already packed up and left. I saw a few other attractive guns (a Mannlicher stocked CZ .22 Hornet, a couple of Miroku clones of the Winchester 52 Sporter) but I was so worn out by that point I couldn’t muster the energy to go back for any of them. Plus they would have been consolation prizes, plus these shouldn’t be hard to find on GunBroker.
It seemed like the show had changed a little since Joe Wanenmacher’s death. I felt like there was more non-gun related junk (candy, jerky, toys, etc.) than there was previously. I personally didn’t hear any vendors complaining, but MtM told me he did. At least the “no scentsy” policy is still in effect.
I did pick up some books at the show which I will be cataloging. Additionally, while we were running around in the days before the show, MtM and I found what seems to be the only used bookstore in Tulsa: Gardner’s Used Books. It is a big sprawling place. I wasn’t expecting much…
…and I walked out with a large box totaling $110 (after a 20% discount for spending over $100) of old gun books and gun magazines. Including some old Gun Digest volumes for the ongoing project (the two earliest being 1960 and 1962: the 1962 one has a particularly cool illustration of a .22 Jet on the cover. That’ll make a good prop when I find one.) and a bunch of American Handgunner annuals and other ephemera. I’m probably not going to catalog all of the box individually, but I may highlight a few specific things I find interesting.
One of the other days we took to visit the U.S. Marshals Museum in Fort Smith, Arkansas. (That’s only about two hours from Tulsa.) The museum just opened in July, and, while it was a nice place to visit and we had a lot of fun, it feels kind of big for the number of exhibits they have. I’m kind of hoping that they plan to bring in even more stuff, and next time when we drag a friend there, it’ll feel a bit more fleshed out.
We had good meals at:
- Siegi’s Sausage Factory, our traditional haunt.
- Biga, a nice Italian place. It felt a little odd to me. Not in the bad sense, but it felt very much like a family owned and run place that was at least a couple of generations old…with waitstaff that looked very young to me, like college kids…but acted like professionals. Highly recommended.
- Prhyme, a downtown steakhouse. I admit, I was a little put off by the spelling of the name, but MtM talked me into it, and I was glad. I wasn’t feeling up to a big steak, so I ordered French Onion soup and what turned out to be a massive charcuterie board that Mike had to help me finish. It was all very very good. And speaking of professional waitstaff, ask for Hannah if you go.
- The Big Biscuit, a chain, but a nice breakfast and lunch place. In spite of the name, they also have pancakes, french toast, and other normal breakfast fare. We could use one of these out in my part of town. Just sayin’.
We had dinner Saturday night with one of my Association friends at a Billy Sims BBQ. The ‘cue was good, but the experience was odd. We actually thought they were closed when we pulled up around 7:30. It wasn’t closed, but they had turned off half the lights in the restaurant so it looked that way from the outside. That left the other half in sort of a semi-dark state, which was mildly annoying but didn’t upset our digestion or our conversation too much.
We also had lunch at a diner type joint in the same center as the Billy Sims, but I can’t remember the name of it for the life of me. If MtM texts it over to me, I’ll update here. (Update 11/17: MtM informs me that it was Ron’s Hamburgers & Chili, which seems to be a regional chain.)
Next trip to Tulsa for Wanenmacher’s is tentatively scheduled for April of 2025. I’m hoping I can drag along recruit a couple more friends to join us on that trip. However, the 2024 S&WCA Symposium is there next June, so I will be going back for that (good Lord willing and the creek don’t rise).
Fun with gun books!
Thursday, November 16th, 2023I think I promised old gun sights last time, so old gun sights is what you’re getting…
Preview of coming attractions. (Random gun crankery)
Saturday, November 4th, 2023I’ve been neglecting gun books and guns for a minute now. It just seems like every time I sit down to try and work on one of my gun related projects, either I just can’t build up the motivation, or I end up getting involved in someone else’s bolshie bushwa.
The early part of next week I’m going on the road. I’m hoping that when I get back, the bushwa should have tapered off, plus the holidays will be approaching, plus my morale will have improved, and I can work on gun books and guns. In the meantime, some quick previews with captions that the educated reader could take as “hints”.
Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!
Three of an imperfect pair.
There is no God but John Moses Browning, and Cooper is his prophet.
I’m kind of hoping that I can get another gun book post up, and maybe even a post about one of these guns, before I leave next week. I’ve already kind of written about one of the pictured guns before, so my post about that one will probably be short (and refer back to older posts) but educational.
We will see how things go.
Obit watch: October 29, 2023.
Sunday, October 29th, 2023It turned into a busier weekend than I thought it was going to be, and it also turned out that there was more going on this weekend than I expected. I wanted to get these up today, as I have an eye doctor’s appointment tomorrow and am not sure how things are going to go afterwards.
Richard Moll. THR. I’ve mentioned before how much I liked the original “Night Court” and what a great ensemble those folks were.
Moll had a shaved head — he did that to play the warrior Hurok in the sci-fi film Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn (1983) — when he auditioned for the role of Shannon on Night Court, created by Reinhold Weege.
“They said ‘Richard, the shaved head looks good. Will you shave your head for the part?” he recalled in a 2010 interview. “I said, ‘Are you kidding? I’ll shave my legs for the part. I’ll shave my armpits, I don’t care.’”
IMDB.
Joan Evans, actress who was shot by Farley Granger.
This is in the obit, but I did want to note that she was the love interest for Charles Drake’s character in “No Name On the Bullet“, about which I have written before and probably will again.
IMDB.
Matthew Perry. THR. IMDB. Everyone is on this like flies on a severed cow’s head at a Damien Hirst installation, and I don’t have anything to add.
You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#111 in a series. Also, random gun crankery.)
Saturday, October 21st, 2023There is no joy in this one.
Larry Vickers pled guilty to federal firearm charges yesterday.
“But,” you say, “Larry Vickers isn’t a political figure.” Right you are, Bob.
Mr. Vickers was charged with four other men: Sean Sullivan, James Tafoya, Matthew Hall, and James Sawyer. Mr. Hall was the chief of police in Coats, North Carolina, and Mr. Sawter was the chief of police of Ray, North Dakota. This is where the flaming hyenas come in.
He was a Fed?! I know, I know, quel fromage! But really?
Allegedly, all of these guys came up with a really clever scheme.
The indictment alleges that, beginning in at least June 2018 through at least March 2021, the defendants conspired to acquire machineguns and/or other restricted firearms, such as short-barreled rifles, by falsely representing that the firearms would be used for demonstration to law enforcement agencies, including the Coats Police Department and the Ray Police Department. The indictment further alleges that Hall, Sawyer, and other conspirators signed law letters with no expectation that the weapons would ever be demonstrated to their respective law enforcement agencies.
The defendants allegedly intended to impermissibly import into the United States and resell the machineguns and other firearms for profit or to keep for their own use and enjoyment. Sullivan allegedly submitted the false law letters to the ATF seeking to import the machineguns and other restricted weapons. Once the firearms were received, Sullivan allegedly kept some of the machineguns and other restricted weapons and transferred some of the weapons to Vickers, Tafoya, and other conspirators.
Now, everyone else hasn’t gone to trial, and should be considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
So just not illegal import of restricted firearms, but also sanction violations. “Between July 2014 and March 2021” makes me wonder who the sanctions violations were against.
I haven’t seen any coverage of this anywhere, including the usual gun blogs. The only reason I know about it is that Mike the Musicologist sent me a link to the Justice Department press release. I feel kind of bad for Mr. Vickers, who also was dealing with cancer a while back. But this doesn’t sound like BATFE “paperwork” violations. This sounds like a pretty serious conspiracy to illegally import restricted weapons under cover of the law enforcement exemption.
While I object to the idea that what these people did should be against the law, the fact remains that it is, and they apparently (“all suspects” etc) tried to camouflage it as “only ones”. You know, “we’re the only ones competent enough to have full-auto weapons. We’re the only ones competent enough to carry a Glock.”
That, I do resent.
Random gun crankery.
Wednesday, October 18th, 2023There have been some gun related news stories over the past few weeks that I want to make note of.
1. Vista Outdoor is selling off their ammunition business to Czechoslovak Group a.s. for $1.91 billion. The Vista Outdoor ammo business includes Speer, Remington’s ammo side, CCI, and Federal.
I can’t find as much information as I would like about Czechoslovak Group. It looks like they currently own Fiocchi, and they are not the same company that owns Colt CZ Group. Czechoslovak Group seems to be big in the defense industry, with the sporting ammo component being relatively small. Perhaps they are looking to expand?
…
So it looks like what’s going to be left of Vista Outdoors Revelyst is going to be fishing, camping, golf, cycling helmets, Camelbacks, and golf. Disclosure: the “gun hedge fund” (which is neither a hedge nor a fund) owns some shares in Vista Outdoor, and may make some money off of this. Vista Outdoor has been one of the best performing stocks in the group, though it’s down considerably right now. ($24.81 a share as I write this.)
You shouldn’t take financial advice from me, but I really don’t see “Revelyst” being a growing business, or one I’d be interested in continuing to invest in.
2. I’m having trouble finding what I think of as really reliable sources for this, but: “According to multiple news sources, the Lake City ammo plant has cancelled all of its commercial contracts.”
This is swell news, he said with some sarcasm, as Lake City produces an estimated 30% of the 5.56 ammo on the civilian market. So if you thought things were rough before…suck air, grab clusters, and stock up on 5.56 if you find it at a good price.
My first thought was that this was stealth gun control by the Sleepy Joe administration: if they can’t restrict the guns, why not restrict the ammo? (“Reloading? What’s that?”) A more rational thought (and what seems to be the conventional wisdom) is that the government is stockpiling ammo, both to refresh the Ukraine and against a possible land war in the Middle East.
Disclaimer: the “gun hedge fund” (see above) also owns stock in Olin Corporation. Olin runs the Lake City plant under contract, and our Olin stock has been the best performer overall in the fund. As a matter of fact, our Olin stock is the only stock in the “fund” that’s currently in the black. ($48.12 a share as I write this.)
3. The Recoil website reported this about two weeks ago: BATFE has banned importation of “non-lethal” training ammo unless it is for use by military or law enforcement customers.
Maybe.
So far, it seems like the only report of this is on Instagram. The post is actually a letter a company called Ultimate Training Munitions sent to Sage Dynamics, but this is backed up by a statement on UTM’s website.
The other big maker of “non-lethal” training ammo is Simunition, which apparently imports from Canada. As far as I know, they have not made any public statement on this yet, even though they have been asked by Recoil, and I assume other outlets.
It is unclear what authority BATFE has to ban import of “non-lethal” training ammo. Perhaps the “sporting purposes” clause. Then again, when has BATFE ever gotten hung up on pesky questions of “legal authority”?