Gun Digest July 2020

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it at least a hundred times: When it comes to a firearm’s true value, the scuffs in the bluing and the dings in the stock mean more than the stamp on the barrel or the receiver ever will. Read that statement again if you must, but it’s a given for a lot of firearms owners. If you’re a collector, I suppose the opposite is true: The right stamp with a lack of blemishes will fetch more at resale. But does a monetary figure truly represent a gun’s overall worth? What about the emotional value to which no price tag can be affixed? Nearly a decade ago, my father-in-law began showing interest in hunting turkeys. He grew up on a very small family farm,…

HISTORICAL NOTES Designed for the Smith & Wesson Model 1½ hinged-frame, single-action revolver introduced in 1878, the .32 Smith & Wesson is an old and very popular cartridge that’s widely used in the United States and Europe for low-priced, pocket-type revolvers. Originally a black-powder cartridge, it’s been loaded with smokeless powder exclusively since 1940. In the United States, Colt, Harrington & Richardson, Hopkins & Allen, Iver Johnson, Smith & Wesson and others have made revolvers for this cartridge. In England, Webley & Scott made revolvers for it. Elsewhere in Europe, Bayard and Pickert revolvers chambered it. The original loading used nine grains of black powder. GENERAL COMMENTS The .32 Smith & Wesson formerly ranked with the .32 Automatic in general popularity—and for the same reasons. It’s low powered and adaptable…

Best CCW Handguns for Women I just finished reading “The Best Concealed Carry Handguns for Women” article online. Good article! It’s important to remember that tiny guns kick hard, so people don’t practice with them and gain confidence—male or female. Everyone should carry what they’re comfortable and confident with, regardless of its size. Mikial, online comment Little guns are built for concealability, not shootability. Period. A small firearm is more comfortable to carry and easier to hide, but that comes at the cost of a belittled sight radius with mitigated grip and frame structure upon which to get a solid purchase. Carrying comfortably is important, but carrying confidently is paramount. Gun Digest editors Testing Bullets in Feral Beef? I just read your online article about Buffalo Bore ammunition (“Buffalo Bore…

The economics of the firearms business can be summed up with this analogy: Do you want to sell dogs or dog food? For Hornady, the answer was simple: ammunition. After all, all firearms need ammunition ... and they always will. The Hornady ammunition story began because Joyce Hornady saw a need in the firearms industry emerging after World War II. He thought a lot of shooters, like him, would need a good bullet to reload. He knew he was right long before the banks did, and he forged ahead with his dream. THE DREAM BEGINS From the beginning, Joyce Hornady made it clear to the world that his business would be brave, daring and practical. Fueled by his core values of building “accurate, deadly, dependable” bullets, Hornady Manufacturing Company continued…

For the past 20 years or so, almost every one of my defensive handguns has had its sights replaced with XS Sights. So, when XS introduced its RAM sights, I thought for a moment the company had named them after me—after all, my initials are “RAM.” Unfortunately, that was not the case. As far as XS Sights are concerned, RAM stands for “Radio Active Material.” The RAM sights are the first 3-dot sights the company has offered. I’ve never been a huge fan of 3-dot sights. The front sight is the one that deserves your focus; and, with many 3-dot sight systems, all three dots are the same size. This could—at least theoretically—lead to confusion. To test these new sights, I installed them on my son’s Gen-4 Glock 19, which…

In the March 2020 Gun Digest issue, there was a letter to the editor from Steve Ham of Georgia. Steve—a self-proclaimed “hillbilly”—was curious why my “Hillbilly Wisdom” comments had been excluded from recent issues. I’ll address that, but I first want to comment on Editor Luke Hartle’s response—specifically, this: “ … I still fail to understand the self-labeled subtitles that differentiate a ‘redneck’ from a ‘hillbilly.’” First of all, “hillbilly” is not a self-labeled subtitle; it’s a geographically descriptive term identifying people born and raised within the Allegheny Mountain Range that extends from north-central Pennsylvania to southwestern Virginia. More broadly, hillbillies call the Blue Ridge and Appalachian Mountains home. But, “hillbilly” is not a birthright. It differentiates between someone born in those areas and someone who was born there and…