…some quick random book geekery. “Quick” because I bought two copies of the same book, for reasons.
Archive for the ‘Guns’ Category
And speaking of Rugers…
Saturday, March 22nd, 2025Packin’ (random gun crankery)
Thursday, March 20th, 2025It would not be entirely unfair to say that I am a sucker for concepts. At least when it comes to guns. But a concept has to make sense to me.
I’ve bought into Cooper’s Scout Rifle concept in a big way.
One concept that ended up not making sense to me, was the “car gun” or “truck gun”. I actually did buy into this, and bought a relatively cheap (at the time) Marlin lever action in .30-30 (the poor man’s assault rifle) to use as a “car gun” when Texas instituted legal protection for guns in cars.
But the more I thought about it, the odds of being able to fight my way out to my car, grab my rifle, and go back in to confront the big bad seemed slim. If I’m already at my car, why am I not getting out of there? And it also seemed like a recipe for a rusty or stolen gun. I’m not the only person who feels that way. (I still have that Marlin, now outfitted with XS ghost ring sights.)
Another concept that makes sense to me is the late (and I feel a pang when I say that) John Taffin’s “Perfect Packin’ Pistol”.
That’s a pretty expansive definition, but I understand where he’s coming from. My old Smith and Wesson Kit Gun is, to me, a perfect packin’ pistol for things like casual walks in the woods, plinking at cans, and maybe shooting a vicious squirrel should the occasion arise. It fits easily in a pocket. And if I had to…the mere presence of a firearm, without a shot being fired, often serves as a deterrent. Or something like that, as the “Armed Citizen” column puts it.
As the linked article notes, Lipsey’s and Ruger are introducing a special John Taffin Tribute Perfect Packin’ Pistol. (I hope you can read the article: I am a Handloader subscriber, but it comes up okay for me even though I’m not signed in. I’m using a link I got in a Wolfe Publishing email.)
When I saw that, I kind of wanted one. I still kind of do. But I walked into my gun shop one Saturday, and…
Obit watch: March 17, 2025.
Monday, March 17th, 2025Guns magazine and American Handgunner are reporting the passing of John Taffin last week. Podcast.
I was fortunate enough to meet him in 2012, shake his hand, and say “thank you”. And I’ve written about some of his books, too.
I’m hoping at some point this week (or by next Sunday) I can get a special gun crankery post up in memory of the late Mr. Taffin. He struck me as a swell guy, and he knew his Smith and Wessons.
Gene Winfield, custom car builder. He did a considerable amount of work in Hollywood.
(Also “Bewitched”.)
He also designed cars for “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.”, “Get Smart”, “Sleeper”, and “Blade Runner”. And he designed the famous shuttle craft from a minor 1960s SF TV series.
Obit watch: March 15, 2025.
Saturday, March 15th, 2025I lost pretty much the entire day yesterday to various things. I didn’t even get any pie.
One of the things that went by the wayside was obits, so here’s a quick and lazy roundup from the past few days. I have to rush off in a little bit to a wedding shower, and I’m not sure when I’m going to be back.
John Feinstein, sports writer and author. The only one of his books I’ve read is The Punch, which I wrote about a while back and thought was pretty good.
Chris Moore, artist. He illustrated quite a few SF books, and also did album covers for Fleetwood Mac and Rod Stewart.
Carl Lundstrom, who was one of the people behind the Pirate Bay website, died in a plane crash on Monday.
Ron Nessen, Gerald Ford’s press secretary, and one of the 892 Saturday Night Live hosts who have not committed murder. (I think that count is right, but it may be a little out of date.)
Larry Buendorf, retired Secret Service agent. He’s the guy who wrestled the gun away from Squeaky Fromme.
“Squeaky was back in the crowd, maybe one person back, and she had an ankle holster on with a .45,” he said, referring to a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol. “That’s a big gun to have on your ankle. So, when it came up, it came up low, and I happened to be looking in that direction, I see it coming, and I step in front of him, not sure what it was other than that it was coming up pretty fast, and yelled out ‘Gun!’ When I yelled out ‘Gun!’ I popped that .45 out of her hand.”
He added: “I got a hold of her fingers, and she’s screaming — the crowd is screaming — and I’m thinking, ‘I don’t have a vest on, I don’t know where the next shot is coming from,’ and that I don’t think she’s alone. All of this is going on while I’m trying to control her.”
“She turns around, and I pulled her arm back and dropped her to the ground, and agents and police come from the back of the crowd” as Ms. Fromme shrieked in disbelief, he said.
“She’s screaming, ‘It didn’t go off!’” he continued. “I had it in my hand. I knew what she was doing, she was pulling back on the slide, and I hit the slide before she could chamber a round. If she’d had a round chambered, I couldn’t have been there in time. It would’ve gone through me and the president.”
If the Times account is to be trusted, she had four rounds in the magazine and the hammer cocked, but she hadn’t chambered a round.
Kevin Drum, leftist political blogger.
Alan K. Simpson, former Republican senator from Wyoming.
Raul M. Grijalva, current Democratic House rep from Arizona.
All gun books, all the time!
Friday, March 7th, 2025This time on “What’s Been Added to my Library of Gun Books” recently, a special all gun books edition! No diversions into subjects such as absinthe or old bibles. Just some new and new old gun books. But I am going to include a gun crankery photo.
Since this is going to be gun book heavy, I’m following my usual policy of inserting a jump so the non-book, non-gun, and non-book non-gun people can skip easily to the next post…
Short gun crankery.
Saturday, January 25th, 2025I refer from time to time to the “Hillary Hole”, aka the internal lock on many recent Smith and Wesson revolvers. This made a lot of people very angry, and has been widely regarded as a bad idea.
Greg Ellifritz posted this article in his weekly link roundup this week. While I do regularly read the Revolver Guy blog, I missed this one before now, and I want to bookmark it for future reference.
“The History and Future of the Smith & Wesson Internal Lock”.
Happy birthday, John Moses Browning!
Thursday, January 23rd, 2025Not really much more to say JMB wise. The day sort of snuck up on me, and the weather this week has not been conducive to taking photos.
SHOT show is going on through tomorrow. I’m not sure if they have any JMB tributes planned, not actually being there for the show and all.
(I did take a look at the requirements for getting media credentials. Frankly, they seem kind of onerous. But it might be worth taking a shot for 2026. What’s the worst that could happen? They say no and I save the price of a ticket to Vegas?)
Speaking of SHOT…as you know, Bob, I am an unabashed Smith and Wesson fanboy. Also as you know, Bob, I own some stock in Smith & Wesson Brands Inc. so I have a vested interest in how well the company does.
With that out of the way, the’ve been introducing some interesting things in the past week or so.
- They’ve extended the line of “Ultimate Carry” revolvers by adding two new ones in .32 H&R Magnum with titanium cylinders. I already have my Ultimate Carry in .38 Special, but I might very well pick up one of these.
- They’ve introduced new “Mountain Guns” in .357 Magnum and .44 Magnum. Also something that’s tempting. The new ones are stainless steel, but it looks like the kind of dull stainless finish that I have on my 625 and I don’t find that obnoxious.
- The “no lock” classics: Model 10, Model 19, and Model 36 with no internal lock.
- Steel framed M&P pistols.
- And some new lever-action 1854 rifles.
I’m personally kind of excited about the way things are going.
(By the way: I wouldn’t exactly say I “missed” National Buy an AK Day. It was just there were so many things happening on Monday that I didn’t really want to post. Plus, I feel like the pressure is off at least until January 20, 2029.)
Random crankery (mostly gun books, a little gun stuff, a little electronic stuff).
Thursday, January 16th, 2025I didn’t manage to get everything done that I wanted to get done during my extended vacation from work. In particular, gun crankery and gun books kind of went by the wayside, for reasons of time and weather.
The gun crankery is still coming. And a thought occurred to me the other day: I can actually do some quick gun book crankery, because I have three new gun books in the stack and can just point folks to those books online. Don’t need to pull out the bibliographies or take pictures. Yes, it is lazy, and yes, there will be less lazy gun book crankery coming. Consider this a stopgap.
More seriously, I do think these new books are worth writing about and promoting to my readers.
In order to avoid disappointing my gun book buddies, I’m going to put the gun books up front. After those, I’m going to talk about one new gun-related item, and one new non-gun related item, so anyone who wants can skip over the non-book parts (or can skip to the non-book parts).
Noted.
Friday, January 10th, 2025This came across Greg Ellifritz‘s “Weekend Knowledge Dump” a few weeks ago, and I thought it was worth sharing:
“46 Things (and Counting) a Young Man Should Know”.
47. Carry a sharp knife, unless precluded by law or venue policy. It doesn’t have to be a machete or Bowie knife: even a small Swiss Army knife or pocketknife is worthwhile.
48. Carry a small flashlight. You can get ones that clip on your keychain and throw a surprising amount of light, and you have no idea how handy they are until you start using them.
Also by way of Mr. Ellifritz: “52 Things I Learned in 2024”.
And by way of Mike the Musicologist: “Big Pistols vs. Small Pistols”, by FotB (and official trainer to WCD) Karl Rehn.
Post Christmas gun book blogging.
Thursday, December 26th, 2024“Did you get any gun books for Christmas?” asked nobody, ever.
Yes, actually, I did. Lawrence gave me a batch of older softcover books he picked up while shopping over Thanksgiving, including a Gun Digest I didn’t have. Someone at work sent me some “funny money” as a thank you for services rendered, which I plan to use to purchase the Standard Catalog of Smith & Wesson, 5th Edition in both the physical and Kindle editions. (It is supposed to be out January 7th according to Amazon, but some people on the forum have reported they’ve already received their copies.) And I’ve been told that I have at least one more present coming, but shipping has been delayed, so I don’t know what that is. Could be a gun book, could be not a gun book. Could be not a book at all.
I also got some books I ordered from Callahan and Company in two separate orders, so I am a bit backlogged. It is probably a good time to start cataloging those. All four of these came in the same C&C order, and there was a total of $8 media mail shipping on top of the stated prices.
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…
Tuesday, December 10th, 2024For another year, Daddy didn’t spend the Christmas money on brakes or other car repairs. Daddy actually got his car inspected with no trouble, and his registration sticker is on the way.
Daddy also got a Christmas tree up this year. Granted, it looks and feels a lot like a toilet bowl brush, but it is the sentiment that counts. Heck, we even have lights on the tree. We also got the mailing labels for our Christmas cards printed without very much trouble, for once.
And Daddy got an early Christmas present this year. Somebody saved us a bit of trouble by putting a bunch of stuff in one place…
“The Guns of ‘Die Hard'” by Will Dabbs, MD.
Because it’s just not Christmas until I see Hans Gruber fall from the Nakatomi Tower.
(While we’re on the subject of Christmas movies, I’d like to put in a plug for another good Christmas movie: “Invasion U.S.A.”. Yes, the one with Chuck Norris. Yes, it is a Christmas movie. Yes, it is kind of silly and stupid and cheesy. But I thought it was a lot of fun.)
The logjam breaks…
Friday, November 29th, 2024I’ve been in kind of a dry spell for vintage gun books. But that broke this week: I have four on the way from Callahan and Company (and I ordered them before Thanksgiving, so I can get away with this), and will be blogging those when they arrive.
In the meantime, though, I’m not working on Black Friday. I did swing by Half-Price Books and picked up two more Gun Digests I didn’t have: 1969, with an article by James E. Serven about “Captain Samuel H. Walker”, and 2022, with an article by Terry Wieland about “The Colt Walker”. I’ll tie this back at the end.
Let us get started…