"When the phone rang, Parker was in the garage, killing a man."
Not a great pic, but this old Colt has finally come home again. Back story later.
I’m sure posting a pic like that, and not posting the story for 37 hours is breaking some kind of ruleOriginally Posted by Lost River
Good looking heater! Worth quoting.
Probably right. Sorry.
In the early 90s I was shooting USPSA competitions, rodeoing for my college, etc. One of my college buddies who I knew through rodeo, wanted to try his hand at USPSA too and decided to build a single stack carry gun that could also be used for competition. I recommended he use the same gunsmith I was using at the time. He asked what I thought was absolutely necessary versus nice to have. He did a few things a bit different than I would have but overall it was a pretty nice gun and a solid carry gun.
I had advised him first and foremost that it needed to run. Reliability was #1. After that it needed good sights, a clean trigger, and a hammer that would not bite him. If he needed a magwell, then get one. I recommended staying away from giant mag buttons, huge paddle safeties, etc.
You can see on the mag release button that it appears to have a hole. That is from being threaded. He put a huge button on it. Exactly what I said not to do, lol. I tossed that later on.
He frequently would sell guns when hurting for cash and this one was no different. I did not have the cash at the time but a quick call to my dad produced $350 dollars and the Colt went to him. He had more than $350 in gunsmithing alone into the Colt.
The gun had the barrel fitted with a Wilson Combat Bulletproof slide stop, hammer, ambi safety. A fitted Wilson match barrel bushing, Wilson Combat polymer magazine well, which I thought would never last and surprisingly has held up amazingly well. I cant remember what brand the trigger is, but it breaks nice and clean.
He had been using shok-buffs in the gun and there was one in it when the gun was picked up by my dad along with a pack of them.
I ended up using the gun off and on when my 70 series (shown below) was in the shop for mods/upgrades, etc.
The 70 Series was my first work gun. In the pic above it has been refinished and rebuilt for a 3rd time. It saw a fair bit of use as a duty/USPSA gun as well as teaching classes on the side for extra cash, so the other Colt came in handy. Though normally I relied on my little Colt Officer's ACP, if I had a chance to swing by my dads I would grab the full size gun.
Fast forward more than a decade or so.
I had purchased a Marvel 1911 .22 conversion. I went for all the bells and whistles. threaded barrel for a suppressor, 1913 rail, and the accurized version. Mine came with a test target that showed 5 shots, 50 yards, .814"s. Needless to say it was/is a tackdriver.
This is about the only pic I have from back in that time frame, along with an AR I built for coyote hunting.
Then I made the mistake of showing it to my dad..
He loves to shoot ground squirrels in the mountains and asked to borrow it. I never got it back! I had switched to carrying a Glock 21 .45 and then went to agencies that issued guns so I had no pressing need for spare guns by this point in time.
My dad put the Marvel .22 conversion on the Colt frame and used it for 15 plus years as his ground squirrel/magpie gun. Now that his eyes have gone a bit south, when I was up at his house this last weekend and I was helping him re-arrange stuff, he gave me the upper, still on the Colt frame. Then I said, hey, how about the slide! So I ended up with the whole gun.
The Colt double diamonds have been worn down to more like double bumps, and the old night sights are very dim, so they are pretty much just three white dots, but it is like handling an old skinny girlfriend who still looks and feels pretty darn nice!
So in a nutshell, it started nearly 30 years ago. It was a good friends, used on one or two occasions as a work gun in a fairly nasty little town that had a migrant farm worker camp, where pointing guns people and getting into fights was pretty much a nightly sport during the summer months. Used by my dad to attempt to eradicate ground squirrels, and noisy magpies, and finally after all that time is now back in Casa Lost River.
I have been carrying the old Pony in my 50th Anniversary Summer Special and it is one of those synergy kind of things, like pretty cowgirls and old flatbeds.
Love the pistol. Love the stories more.it is one of those synergy kind of things, like pretty cowgirls and old flatbeds.
So very much this ^^^^!!!!!
Lost, you have a great way of telling your stories and creating captions for your photos. Whenever I see your username, I have to read it.
Thanks from one of PF's most dedicated lurkers.
"We are the domestic pets of a human zoo we call civilization."
Laurence Gonzales - "Deep Survival."
Great story, but now we need to know what’s up with the stack of cash.Probably right. Sorry.
In the early 90s I was shooting USPSA competitions, rodeoing for my college, etc. One of my college buddies who I knew through rodeo, wanted to try his hand at USPSA too and decided to build a single stack carry gun that could also be used for competition. I recommended he use the same gunsmith I was using at the time. He asked what I thought was absolutely necessary versus nice to have. He did a few things a bit different than I would have but overall it was a pretty nice gun and a solid carry gun.
I had advised him first and foremost that it needed to run. Reliability was #1. After that it needed good sights, a clean trigger, and a hammer that would not bite him. If he needed a magwell, then get one. I recommended staying away from giant mag buttons, huge paddle safeties, etc.
You can see on the mag release button that it appears to have a hole. That is from being threaded. He put a huge button on it. Exactly what I said not to do, lol. I tossed that later on.
He frequently would sell guns when hurting for cash and this one was no different. I did not have the cash at the time but a quick call to my dad produced $350 dollars and the Colt went to him. He had more than $350 in gunsmithing alone into the Colt.
The gun had the barrel fitted with a Wilson Combat Bulletproof slide stop, hammer, ambi safety. A fitted Wilson match barrel bushing, Wilson Combat polymer magazine well, which I thought would never last and surprisingly has held up amazingly well. I cant remember what brand the trigger is, but it breaks nice and clean.
He had been using shok-buffs in the gun and there was one in it when the gun was picked up by my dad along with a pack of them.
I ended up using the gun off and on when my 70 series (shown below) was in the shop for mods/upgrades, etc.
The 70 Series was my first work gun. In the pic above it has been refinished and rebuilt for a 3rd time. It saw a fair bit of use as a duty/USPSA gun as well as teaching classes on the side for extra cash, so the other Colt came in handy. Though normally I relied on my little Colt Officer's ACP, if I had a chance to swing by my dads I would grab the full size gun.
Fast forward more than a decade or so.
I had purchased a Marvel 1911 .22 conversion. I went for all the bells and whistles. threaded barrel for a suppressor, 1913 rail, and the accurized version. Mine came with a test target that showed 5 shots, 50 yards, .814"s. Needless to say it was/is a tackdriver.
This is about the only pic I have from back in that time frame, along with an AR I built for coyote hunting.
Then I made the mistake of showing it to my dad..
He loves to shoot ground squirrels in the mountains and asked to borrow it. I never got it back! I had switched to carrying a Glock 21 .45 and then went to agencies that issued guns so I had no pressing need for spare guns by this point in time.
My dad put the Marvel .22 conversion on the Colt frame and used it for 15 plus years as his ground squirrel/magpie gun. Now that his eyes have gone a bit south, when I was up at his house this last weekend and I was helping him re-arrange stuff, he gave me the upper, still on the Colt frame. Then I said, hey, how about the slide! So I ended up with the whole gun.
The Colt double diamonds have been worn down to more like double bumps, and the old night sights are very dim, so they are pretty much just three white dots, but it is like handling an old skinny girlfriend who still looks and feels pretty darn nice!
So in a nutshell, it started nearly 30 years ago. It was a good friends, used on one or two occasions as a work gun in a fairly nasty little town that had a migrant farm worker camp, where pointing guns people and getting into fights was pretty much a nightly sport during the summer months. Used by my dad to attempt to eradicate ground squirrels, and noisy magpies, and finally after all that time is now back in Casa Lost River.
I have been carrying the old Pony in my 50th Anniversary Summer Special and it is one of those synergy kind of things, like pretty cowgirls and old flatbeds.
Bank heist?
It was a great story.
I'm guessing home printed.
"... And miles to go before I sleep".
And it’s too clean to be part of the DB Cooper stash [emoji41]It was a great story.
I'm guessing home printed.
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