Posted on 11/10/2007 1:20:58 PM PST by DogByte6RER
Two guns owned by Mexican folk hero Pancho Villa up for auction
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Associated Press
SAN ANTONIO – Whether or not Pancho Villa is remembered as an infamous outlaw or a revolutionary hero, everyone agrees that the folk hero of the 1910 Mexican Revolution always carried guns.
Now two of those firearms, and one that belonged to frontierswoman "Calamity Jane," will be up for bidding in an auction beginning Saturday in Fredericksburg. The auction is open for public preview on Friday.
"He always carried a gun to the day of his death and he didn't care what it was," Tom Burks, manager of the auction and former curator for the Texas Ranger Museum in Waco, said of Villa. "He knew his life didn't depend on a fancy gun."
Also Online Frontier Times Western Auction But one of them is a real beaut'.
Villa's Remington single action revolver, engraved with a scroll pattern, will clearly be the star of the auction. The big draw is that it has Villa's real name, "Doreteo Arango," engraved on one side of the barrel. On the other side is "Chih-1914," around the time Villa became governor of the Mexican state of Chihuahua.
Burks said the gun model dates to 1875.
Another gun in the auction, which features about 1,000 Old West items, once belonged to "Calamity Jane," Burks said. The pocket pistol, which comes in its leather case, bears the moniker "Martha Jane Cannary," the frontierswoman's real name.
Also available is a mauser carbine rifle that Villa reportedly dropped in the Rio Grande during a skirmish with opposition forces. Documents accompanying the rifle say a woman fished it out of the water and sold it to a young man who later gave it to his sister.
(Excerpt) Read more at dallasnews.com ...
I wondered what they had that mechanical horse up at the livery stable scenario for!!!!!!
I’m sure your club doesn’t but like the guy who was shooting at our club, it doesn’t take much for a spectator to get the wrong idea as to the rules. There’s gamesters in all of our sports that take the fun out of it for the rest of us.
One incident comes to mind. There was a competitor who ran out of rounds on the last target. Instead of losing time by reloading, he took the miss by yelling out, “BANG”. The spectators including me gave out a silent WTF. When the awards were issued our hero was tied for first place. If I remember, the officials knocked him down to third.
By the way, I would love to see a picture of your Webley. I’ve liked them since watching the movie, “The Mummy”.
You'd never know without a chrono stage. I can just about guarantee the top finishers are shooting light loads.
If not, they'll eventually get beat my somebody that is.
And if you 'don't know without a chrono stage,' how the heck are YOU perceiving that they're downloading, hmmm?
Answer: By the visible recoil and noise, of course, just like I do.
If you caught him in a good mood, he'd have chuckled and asked you what you were going to throw in for boot. When I met him, he admired the work done on my not-exactly stock M1911/Commander by the late Armand Swenson, and I offered to trade him for his gold-plated and trimmed M1911A1, which I believe was one that came back from the War in the Pacific with him. The *How much more for boot* answer was the reply I got...so no deal. We both knew I wasn't really serious.
There was a doctor who had his Scout rifle signed by Cooper with a magic marker. I realized he now had a rifle he would be nuts to continue to use after that.
Colonel Cooper was curious about the yellow plastic grip on the ejection port side of my M1911A1, and I explained to him that it was an old tank crewman's affectation, being severely discouraged by higher headquarters, but frequently observed in our tank battalion, which at the time had posted the highest-ever tank gunnery scores recorded on the NATO/USAREUR gunnery range. In a tanker's shoulder holster, the only grip that shows to a viewer is the rightside/ ejection port-side grip panel.
He dug around in his stuff and came up with a well-used and yellowed ivory grip panel for the other [slidestop] side, smooth and uncheckered. And he signed it for me.
It's now instead on the Swenson bobcat he had handled and admired that day. The Colonel was most certainly a class act.
Them was the days when a feller was taught that he held his reins in t'other hand, or his saber.
Better'n getting callked cowpoke. Some folks get fussy 'bout that....
In a bar in Organ, New Mexico [well, actually in the only bar in Organ, New Mexico] they had on proud display in a red velvet lined and glass-framed case a remarkably beat-up Colt Peacemaker revolver, along with a brass tag telling any interested observers that this historical piece was The only handgun in New Mexico not used by Pat Garret to kill Billy the Kid.
They had a pretty fair number of other interesting pieces on the wal and hanging from the ceiling of that ol' place, some shootin' irons and some not.
My only complaint came when I showed up with a gunbelt at which a couple of their purists turned up their noses, until I showed them a photograph of my maternal grandfather wearing it, a relic of Wyoming's Johnson County Wars.
They were also annoyed that I was wearing dirty coveralls instead of the fancy Western duds they favored, and I apologized, having soiled the things a bit the day before when I was firing a coal-powered steam locomotive with a scoop shovel, the motor driven auger feeder being out of service for new bearings. But the overalls and Hickory cap were also authentic to the period, though I probably should have worn my derby.
Helpfully, my girlfriend at the time was a Lakota sweetie who answered every question put to her in the language her grandmother had taught her. And she outshot me in the Frontiersman black powder handgun category, though she was in a *greenhorn* class.
I looked into the SASS stuff (as the End of the Trail range is about 3 miles from me), but it seemed like a pretty pricey dress-up game.
I’d like to see a group that gets together and shoots classic DA revolvers and pretends to be McGivern, Jordan, Bryce and Askins.
PS: I hit a dry hole with the Ed Brady search. Sorry about that.
You can't hear or see 100 or 200 fps, nor can you hear or see lighter bullets.
If SASS shot poppers or falling plates, that would make it obvious, but they don't.
Whether or not your club "downloads" isn't really the point - SASS does not mandate a PF, so there is no incentive to shoot full power ammo.
On the contrary, for those seeking to be competitive, there is significant incentive to shoot light loads.
That's not a bad thing in itself, but I'd be a lot more impressed if SASS mandated a minimum PF.
I've got an old shop address and phone number, but would like to find out if the fella is still alive. His work is beautifully done, and examples turn up from time to time in the hands of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and DOE shipment escort personnel around those nondescript lime green Tri-States Motor Transportation trucks.
Which shop?
Wasn't that pretty much what Thell Reed and Ray Chapman were doing with the first California Combat Pistol League shoots, which eventually morped into IPSC around 1976 or so?
I'd add a couple of additional names to that list of the old fellers who were the greats, however. At least five more come to mind....
I can tell the difference when hubby has 5 gr Unique in the .45 ACP and 7 gr . . . . about 200 fps difference but there is a definite change in the sound AND the recoil.
Little squib loads in a .38 sound like a wet paper bag.
I know Thell and Ray were shooting at the Leatherslap meets with the late Col. Cooper (from reading, I’m way too young to have been there)
What other pistoleros did I miss? Rex Applegate?
I'll trade you, I've got the receipt from the last supper.
Eaker, me etc ......:o)
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