Another Circle Closed

by Charles, Friday, July 12, 2013, 13:11 (4096 days ago)
edited by Charles, Friday, July 12, 2013, 16:01

The first S&W Combat Magnum. I ever saw was in the Spring of 1959 inFisher's Café on Elizabeth Street in Brownsville, Texas. It was in the holster of a tall Border Patrolman. I knew the Patrolman through the local skeet club to which we both belonged. A few months later we met again on a bend in the Rio Grande River known as "Las Prietas", which is now a sub division. I was shooting and he allow me to fire off a cylinder from his Combat Magnum. His name was Bill Jordan.

It would be 1965 before I had my own and by then it was the Model 19. I had Stelzigs Saddlery in Houston make me a black Sam Browne belt and bought a black Border Patrol holster from Bianchi. I spent many hours trying to learn to draw and shoot half as good as Jordan. I never made the grade, but developed a real bond with that pistol.

In 1971, I was back in school at a Seminary in Kentucky and had to sell the Model 19 to pay tuition, buy food or some such basic need. I have missed it ever since.

I just pulled the trigger on a Model 19-2 on Gunbroker and in the due course of time it will be in my hands. It is of the right vintage to take me back to the days on the river at Las Prietas. That was 54 years ago, but it seems like just last week.

When it gets here, I will post some pics...stay tuned! I still have the old Bianchi holster, but the Sam Browne belt is long gone, and I would have to wear it around my thigh anyway these days. I might buy me a good River Belt, if I can find one big enough. These were plain black 2 1/4 leather belts with billets.