It’s Valentine’s Day—but sharp-eyed readers know it marks something else as well: the 115th anniversary of the legendary 1911. On February 14, 1911, John Moses Browning was awarded U.S. Patent No. 984,519 for the pistol that would become the iconic Model 1911.
Up to March 29, 1911, the official military hand arm of the United States was the Colt’s .38 caliber revolver. But on that day, as a result of the movement of powerful forces too strong to be resisted and which have been acting for very long, that good old revolver became obsolete and in its stead there was marked for the holsters of this Nation’s defenders the .45 Colt’s automatic; the latest, the most deadly, the finest and the best hand arm which had yet to be produced by man.
From the very beginning of those definite steps that the War Department people have taken to investigate the usefulness of the automatic pistol as a hand arm, the readers of Arms and the Man have been fully advised.
It is known to you that the present Chief of Ordnance, Brig. Gen. William Crozier, his chief assistant, Col. John T. Thompson and other officers of the Army have long had an abiding faith in the ultimate demonstration of the superiority of the automatic pistol over the revolver for military use. Perhaps Colonel Thompson was one of the earliest as well as the staunchest of these believers in ultimate automatic supremacy.
By NRA Staff
