Gaston Glock has passed away at 94. TFB. NYT (gift link, should work for others). Glock website.
Tom Smothers, of the Smothers Brothers. THR.
Lee Sun-kyun, Korean actor (“Parasite”).
Archive for the ‘Guns’ Category
Obit watch: December 27, 2023.
Wednesday, December 27th, 2023Christmas Eve gun crankery.
Sunday, December 24th, 2023A short one for you. My book buddy in the Association sent me scans from a 1928 Smith and Wesson catalog, along with a scan of a letter from the great Walter Roper. This was a very nice Christmas present, and one I can’t thank him enough for.
You will find each of our arms fully described in the catalog we are enclosing but we want you to ask any questions you may wish about either guns or ammunition, as it will be a real pleasure to help you select a revolver.
The past was another country.
I don’t want to reproduce the whole thing, as I’m not sure about the copyright status and I don’t want to make my book buddy mad. However, I thought people might find this one page interesting, and I think it qualifies as fair use. Keep in mind, this is 1928 data.
Endorsed.
Saturday, December 23rd, 2023I would not have expected to find a swell Christmas story on the Revolver Guy blog.
It was the gun book post before Christmas…
Friday, December 22nd, 2023How do you feel about gunstocks?
Not gun stocks, but gunstocks. The kind made out of wood, back in the day before synthetics became common.
After the jump, some more Samworths for those of you who still like wood.
Puppies!
Thursday, December 21st, 2023Over the weekend, we got into a discussion: why are bullpup rifles called “bullpups”?
Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! (Random gun crankery.)
Thursday, December 21st, 2023This is going to be a shorter than usual gun crankery post, since it touches on a lot of things I’ve written about before.
For example, I’ve written a lot about .45 ACP revolvers with moon clips. As I noted in that post, the first one I shot was a S&W 625 JM at the late Smith and Wesson Shooting Sports Center.
I’ve also written a lot about Jerry Miculek. You remember Jerry Miculek, don’t you?
He used a 625 to set the 12 shots with a reload in 2.99 seconds record. I don’t think it was a 625-8 JM, as I believe that was introduced after he set the record. (The Standard Catalog says the 625-8 was introduced in 2001, as an engineering change that added the lock. It also says the 625 JM was introduced at SHOT in 2005.) But it was a 625, it was almost certainly modified by the Performance Center to his specifications, and he almost certainly had input into the design of the 625-8 JM.
Even though it is a stainless steel revolver, the sort-of dull (I think “bead blasted”) finish isn’t obnoxious to me. So when one of these showed up used at my official arms dealer…
Rockin’ the signed JM hat there.
Unfortunately, it does have the internal lock (or as some call it, “the Hillary hole”).
I didn’t get keys for the lock. (I did get moon clips, and a moon clip tool.) It came unlocked, and I’m not sure I’m ever going to use the lock. But here’s a fun fact for you. Do you know where you can get keys for the internal lock on a S&W revolver? Amazon, that’s where.
I think that “gold bead” (which is probably not an actual “gold bead”, but I can’t think of a better description) sight is very nice. I’d love to take this out and shoot a bowling pin match or something similar with this one. This also wouldn’t be a bad barbecue gun, with a nice holster and maybe some tasteful engraving.
Here is another interesting fact: Smith and Wesson claims to offer Performance Center gunsmithing services. The “Outdoor Package Large Frame – N” looks particularly interesting. I’ve measured the trigger pull on this one, and it comes in right at 11 pounds. That’s probably not out of line, but I wouldn’t mind shaving some off of that. As long as it goes “bang” when I pull the trigger.
Sometime after Christmas, I plan to give them a call and see what the backlog for those services is. I know I’m not the only person wondering, and I also get the feeling that S&W (like everyone else) is being pinched by the gunsmith shortage.
Review of the 625 JM from The Firearm Blog.
Coming up: two more followup teaser posts, plus another post about a gun I’ve written about previously. I’m hoping to get at least one of those up before Christmas.
It’s beginning to look a lot like gun books…
Wednesday, December 20th, 2023…everywhere you go. At least, here on this blog.
Last Friday was my last day at work until January 8th. Some of this is me burning PTO before year-end, some of this is corporate holidays, and some of it is mandatory corporate shutdowns.
I’m planning to do more gun book posts and random gun crankery during my vacation, including a few things you’ve seen teasers for. So strap in, my people. It’s going to be a fun couple of weeks.
Why don’t we start out with a slice of history? After the jump…
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.