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God created all men. Sam Colt made them equal. Both of those sentences are bullshit. Colt didn’t invent the revolver, he just made it better. Better at killing people. His most popular model was the “Peacemaker.” That’s another bit of bullshit.
--On This Day in History, Shit Went Down: February 25, 1836--
As a boy, Sam preferred to read a science encyclopedia rather than the Bible, and who can blame him? He read stories of inventors creating devices previously thought impossible and was determined to join their ranks. Working in his father’s textile mill taught him how things were made, and affected how his revolvers would be manufactured.
The first revolver was a flintlock, patented by Elisha Collier, but with the invention of the percussion cap—a far superior method of igniting gunpowder to send a metal projectile in the direction of whatever it was you wanted to die—Colt patented his first revolver on February 25, 1836. Called the Colt Paterson, because it was made in Paterson, New Jersey, it was kind of a piece of shit. Only .28 caliber, five rounds, and you basically had to take the fucking thing apart to reload it.
Things did not go well for his fledgling shooty-boom company, but that changed in 1847 when a Texas Ranger asked him to make a six-shooter that could reload easily and “be powerful enough to kill a man with a single shot.” He placed an order for 1,000 pistols. Colt’s business grew for several reasons: the weapons had interchangeable parts, assembly line manufacturing, and he was a masterful marketer. He made using a revolver to send people into the great beyond seem cool. And because of the industrialized manufacturing, they were affordable for almost anyone who was pissed off and wanted to do some killin’. By the time Colt died in 1862, a year into the American Civil War where he was selling weapons to both sides, he was a multimillionaire. His wife Elizabeth kept the business going after his death. The Peacemaker came into being in 1873 and was the standard U.S. military service revolver for the next two decades. A lot of other nations’ militaries bought them up as well. To keep the peace, of course.
Colt Manufacturing makes all kinds of firearms now. Although they didn’t develop the weapons, for many years the company was responsible for the manufacture of all AR-15 and M16 rifles. I know AR-15s are in the news a lot, and yeah it’s fucking stupid to want to own one—just how shitty of a shot are you that you need 30 rounds to take down a fucking deer? But all the legitimate outrage over the AR-15 overshadows the real threat of handgun ownership in America, because on average, at least two-thirds of death-by-gun homicides in the U.S. are committed with a handgun. Another stat: There are 120 guns for every 100 people in America. Second place is Yemen, with 53 guns per 100 people.
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I am clearly falling behind on my gun ownership. I only have one handgun and 2 rifles, in a household of 4 in Virginia. We didn't even buy the hand gun. Someone was trying to sell it to my husband, then moved without reclaiming it...15 years ago now. We live in a very rural area, no 30 feral hogs attacking my teen children, although the neighbor's pigs once got loose and destroyed a flowerbed. That said, rabid animals wander into the yard, possums, foxes and raccoons, attempt to eat your chickens, and bears attack your dog. I can't say I would like to defend my dog by beating the bear to death with a shovel, and I don't want to get that close to something rabid. There is a vast difference between having a gun in an urban area, and a rural one.
"There are 120 guns for every 100 people in America."
As well as a taser for every two balls....