Firearms buffs generally associate Colt’s Paterson revolver, the first truly practical revolver, with the year 1836, when this revolutionary handgun...
Hell on the Buffalo Range
Life on the buffalo range was hard, dangerous work, often accomplished in extreme heat or freezing conditions, sometimes under the watchful eye of...
The Sideways Grip—Cool or Crazy?
Hollywood loves the catchy, visual “piece of business,” as moviemakers like to say. One thing that has caught on big-time with modern films, and in...
A Pistoleer Goes Semi Auto
While we generally think of the Wild West as the era of the revolver—and it certainly was—the last decade of the 19th century and the dawning of the...
A Pistol For Dragoons
With the adoption of the U.S. Dragoons on March 5, 1833, the U.S. Army found itself woefully lacking in pistols for a mounted unit. Handguns at that...
Virgil’s Sixgun
Although the infamous Gunfight Near the OK Corral is arguably the best known and most written about shootout in the Old West, little is known about...
The Shoots Far Gun
American Indians called the Sharps buffalo rifle the “Shoots Far Gun,” or the gun that “shoots today and kills tomorrow,” and for good reason. In...
On the Hunt for Geronimo
Five thousand against 140! With Geronimo’s breakout from the San Carlos Reservation in Arizona on May 17, 1885, the U.S. Army conducted the most...
Hickok’s Number One
In 1866 Westerner wrote, “The new arm of the west, called a Smith-and-Weston [sic], is a pretty tool; as neat a machine for throwing slugs into a...