Keep Your Fancy Customs!

I gotta be me.” That’s good. We all should do that. Don’t just say it — do it! But know your “do it” attitude might not be someone else’s cup of tea. And in this case, customizing just isn’t for me … but read on before you start writing letters to His Editorship.
John you need to quit worrying about what Elmer did nearly 100 years ago and what he would think. Elmer was a grand old guy. I know because in 1973 I spent a couple hours at his home visiting with him. He was gracious and kind to a fledgling gun writer with only a half-dozen printed articles to his credit. But he’s been gone nearly three decades now. Accept it. Move on!

My opinion isn’t that custom handguns are bad; and believe me, I appreciate the talent and metal working skill that goes into making them. I just don’t have much need for them.

Way back in the ’70s I did not “customize” that Ruger Super Blackhawk .44 Magnum like you mentioned. I merely had its barrel cut off 2″ so it wouldn’t poke the saddle when I rode. It was the same reason I had Smith & Wesson cut back my 6½” Model 29 .44 Magnum to 5″. Back in those younger and much skinnier years I rode horses thousands of miles around the mountains of Montana and Wyoming. That’s not customization: those were simple alterations. Even though I haven’t been on a horse now in nearly 20 years I still have my hand-made saddle, but that shortened Super Blackhawk is long gone and nearly forgotten. The 5″ Model 29 is still here. It hasn’t been fired in years though.

The Difference

Personalize a handgun, especially with custom grips? You bet! Again that’s not customizing, because heaven knows most factory issue handgun grips are near worthless. However all but a few of my grips are practical. That is, they are wood, and with Colt SAAs they are usually one-piece as the US Army chose to use, because they are super strong. Fancy ivory grips? I’ve a few but for me they are just too fragile. The only really fancy ivory grips I have are those made for me by Paul Persinger of El Paso. Those went on a Colt Custom Shop SAA .45 presented to me by Hank Williams Jr. It has factory letters as a special order by him, but with my name engraved on the back strap. I felt it deserved something special.

I have one other handgun with extremely fancy grips. Clint Smith and I were born on the same day, in the same year, no less. For one of our birthdays Clint presented me with one of those fine Les Baer Thunder Ranch Special 1911 .45s. Then the next year at birthday time he gave me a set of custom engraved silver grips for it with my initials inlaid in them. It is indeed a “special” handgun. Those two .45s are among my most prized possessions.

The only other non-wooden custom grips, I’ve ever been excited about, are made of a bison’s thighbone as crafted by a friend no longer in the business. They are attractive but much, much, tougher than ivory. I could easily live without more ivory grips, but if I could get them I definitely would have more of bison bone.

Bangles And Beads

Ornamentation such as engraving, initials inlaid in gold, brands, or even a name on your handguns? Once again, you bet, but with a proviso: don’t thereafter turn the darn thing into a closet queen because it’s so fancy. I went the engraved route on a few handguns, but then didn’t use them much, if at all. Who in the world was I saving them for, some other fellow down the road? So I sold them because they were just gathering dust. A few years back I even bought Yvonne and myself a pair of US Firearms’ beautiful .44-40s with a modicum of engraving, but they’re for shooting first not for just looking at.

I have been truly impressed with precisely one engraved handgun seen a few years back at a gun show. That was a 1890s vintage Colt SAA that had 100-percent coverage. Much of the engraving was worn almost smooth because somebody carried that big .45 an extreme amount — as in many hundreds or perhaps thousands of days. To me that handgun-totter was a true American Handgunner! I wish I’d bought that one.
One handgun I do have with a name on it impressed me too. It’s a pre-war S&W .357 Magnum with the name Gene Henslee engraved into the side plate. It also has special sights, a special offset hammer spur and factory letters with those additions. It shows a bit of holster wear. Old Gene was also a true American Handgunner too.

What I don’t want to see on handguns are useless do-dads. Back in my younger years, my goal was to own every Smith & Wesson built on either the K- or N-frame; I came darn close. Conversely, I never looked seriously at a Colt Python. Why? Because although it had a beautiful blue finish and extremely smooth action, somebody decided to saddle it with that useless ventilated rib. The same goes for those ridiculous full under lug barrels Smith & Wesson puts on so many revolvers nowadays. They just add weight and serve no purpose … at least in my humble opinion.

And John, I have to say the same goes for that barrel band front sight that is part and parcel to that Keith Number Five .44 Special. It took wonderful skill for those guys to machine that from a block of steel, but as far as I can see it just adds weight to an already heavy handgun.

I told him to make me a set of glasses that focus perfectly on that revolver’s sights. I also told him I didn’t give a flip what the rest of the world looked like through those glasses as long as the sights were clear. He did a bang-up job and when wearing those I can see any handgun’s sights, and the targets aren’t overly blurry either. That money was better spent that putting it into some custom handgun feature.

Thusly, I can still use the tiny blade and groove on my favorite Colt SAAs to perfection. Those are the .44 WCF 1873-1973 Peacemaker Centennials Colt put out back in 1975. I can also clearly see the tiny sights on original Colt 1911s; hence my excitement, in 2009, about finding a wonderful shooting-one made in 1918. It came complete with the original owner’s name carved into the holster, plus the year “1931” and with the US Army’s Signal Corps’ insignia. His name is also etched on the base of the original magazine. Now those are “custom” features I can get excited about.

Customs Good-Bye

A while back I decided to sell off a portion of my handgun collection. One that went was a custom Colt SAA having a Bisley style hammer spur and special 3¾” barrel, with likewise shortened ejector rod housing. One that stayed was an ordinary Colt Sheriff’s Model with a 3″ barrel, sans ejector rod housing. Why keep it and not the custom gun? Loaded with shot cartridges it’s my packing-in-the-hip pocket revolver used for the rattlesnakes common here on my Montana property. It’s lighter and shorter than the custom .45 and hence more practical for that purpose.

Also, I would like to stress just how unimpressed I am with all the wildcat cartridges and especially the ultra big bore ones, whether they are wildcats or factory issue. My take on things like .475s and .500s is that if you need a handgun that big, brother you are in dire need of a rifle! While I don’t live in grizzly country now, my home does set in prime black bear habitat. I don’t keep some hand-cannon handy by the door. Instead there is a pump 12 gauge with 00 buckshot.

With that said, I do see the point in someone packing a big bore handgun in case of bear trouble. In fact, an elk hunter right in this very county a couple of years back saved his life with a handgun. A grizzly had him face down and was chewing on his back. He got his handgun out pushed it back over his shoulder in the general direction of the grizzly’s mouth and pulled the trigger. The bear left him then and game wardens found it later dead with a severe wound to its jaw hinge. Unfortunately the newspaper stories didn’t tell what sort of handgun the fellow was packing. Personally, if I was roaming about in grizzly country again I’d likely pick one of those S&W .500s with 4″ barrel and I’d carry it in a holster strapped across my chest.

Custom Finishes?

My personal idea of a handgun with a “custom” finish is one that shows considerable wear from being used but not abused. Preferably — but not necessarily — that use all came from me. That means that said handgun was a reliable companion as I (or someone) went through life’s trials. That also means it wasn’t just a play-pretty that set in a drawer.

What I want from a handgun is function over form. That is it must work every time the trigger is pulled, hit where it’s pointed, and isn’t a nuisance when it’s packed around. I have such ranging from an inexpensive Hungarian made PA63 9mm Makarov to my beautiful US Firearms and Colt single actions, and on to my Colt, Kimber and Les Baer 1911s. All of them can be bought right off the shelf.

PS: John, you really hurt my feelings with that comment, “… you have to get away from the idea that a matte blue rusty old Nagant is really something to get excited about.” Heck John, play fair. Roy asked me to check them out, so I did, and wrote the Russians were idiots to adopt such a clunker. Now, maybe a Japanese Nambu might be just a bit different though!

Editor’s Note: It seems Taffins article (“I Gotta’ Be Me,” May/June 2010) about his penchant for customizing handguns struck a chord with Duke — and Duke doesn’t necessarily agree.

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