BIRDS OF PREY - Jeffersonian

Hollywood
60-Shot Colts
Proof John had
“the affliction”
bad. Note the
carefully applied
mustache and
suitably soulful
cowboy eyes.
Note one of the earliest examples of
gangsta’ gun holding. Here, a revolutionary
war hero blasts a bad guy using
a side-ways hold we’re all familiar with
today. And we thought we invented it? Ha!
John’s wife was not
amused when he up-turned
the dining room table. “But
Roy said to do it.” I wonder
if he found out if it was
bullet proof?
like most Baby Boomers,
I acquired my first understanding
of handgun ballistics
from watching television in
the 1950s and 60s, the same
place I learned about foreign languages
and physics. How sad kids today are
apparently unaware that skunks speak
French, or that a cast-iron frying pan is
handy for reshaping heads.
The first thing the TV taught me
about handguns is a Colt single-action
revolver isn’t very powerful. This was
demonstrated both during the act of
firing, and by the results. Apparently
cowboy-era bullets had a hard time
making it out of the barrel, because
all the really good shootists flung
their Colts forcefully toward
the target as they pulled the
trigger, to help speed the
bullets on their way. This
evidence was supported by
the fact no bad guys (black
cowboy hats with bandanas
tied across their faces) ever
developed a bullet hole,
even when shot across a
poker table. Instead they just
jerked slightly, as if tapped
by an invisible frying pan,
then placed their hands over
their chests and died.
These two pieces of evidence
were corroborated by
saloon gunfights. Shortly
after the fight started, somebody
would turn a poker table
on its side and hide behind it, occasionally
poking their eyes and sixgun over
the top to shoot. Meanwhile the other
guys would shoot at the table, but their
bullets wouldn’t penetrate the wood.
Apparently saloon-keepers bought
really good poker tables in those days,
but cheaped-out on chairs, since the
chairs broke into kindling when bashed
over a black cowboy hat.
Experience
As I grew more sophisticated, say
around age eight, I noticed this ballistic
law was reversed when shooting
through the back of the table. This happened
occasionally when somebody
seated at a poker table shot upward
through the table. These bullets always
blew on through, even when shot from
a derringer, with plenty of power left
to kill a bad guy. Maybe in those days
a special varnish was applied to poker
tables, that could only be penetrated
from the back side.
Things changed along about the
late 1960s, a time of social and Hollywood
upheaval. First, bullets started
making holes in people, and not just
in bad guys — partly because bad
guys quit wearing black hats, so they
weren’t quite so easily identified.
Also, revolvers apparently became
more powerful. Instead of the shooter
having to push the muzzle forward
during firing, revolvers started jerking
backwards at the shot. This tendency
grew until Dirty Harry’s shooting hand
went flying backwards as if he’d just
touched a hot frying pan.
In addition to acquiring bullet
holes — and actually bleeding sometimes
— the victims of these newlyempowered
revolvers often went flying
as well, sometimes over vehicles and
sometimes through walls. After all, as
Harry stated, the .44 Magnum was the
world’s most powerful handgun.
Eventually, of course, technology
marched on and firepower overtook
sheer power. There had always been
some tendency in this direction even
in cowboy days, when 6-shooters often
shot 60 times without reloading. But
after Hollywood discovered the highcapacity
autoloader lead really flew.
Apparently shooting so much faster
resulted in a tendency for the handgun
to torque in the shooter’s hand. This
was compensated for by holding the
gun sideways. A little-known fact, at
least in America where knowledge
of Down-Under movies is limited to
Breaker Morant and Crocodile Dundee,
is that Australian-screen gangbangers
have to hold their autos tilted the other
way to compensate for the Coriolis
effect in the southern hemisphere.
Sparking
Another ballistic advance arrived
with sparking bullets. Evidently these
are coated in some high-tech ceramic,
perhaps mixed with magnesium,
52 WWW.AMERICANHANDGUNNER.COM • JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2010