![\"Cover](\"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/ColtBook-677x1024.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nIn the first\nhalf of the 19th<\/sup> Century, the author states, \u201c\u2026many if not most\nAmerican households had at least a rudimentary firearm, with a greater\nprevalence in the south and west than in the north.\u201d He noted Col. Colt\u2019s\npenchant for gift guns presented to \u201cinfluencers\u201d of the time, with some\ningenious packaging, \u201c\u2026putting some of the guns inside false books, a gimmick,\nbut one that hinted knowingly at the future of these guns. Law for Self Defense <\/em>was the title on the spine of one of these\nbooks. Other titles included The Tourists\nCompanion <\/em>and The Common Law of\nTexas.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you think\nyou\u2019re seeing scalper prices from some firearms dealers now, in the wake of 2020\u2019s\npandemic and rioting, consider what happened in the 1849 California gold rush.\nWrites Rasenberger, \u201cOne measure of the value Californians placed on Colt\nrevolvers was what they were willing to pay for them. The price of nearly every\nproduct was inflated wildly in California in 1849, and especially that of guns.\nRifles that cost $13 in New York sold in California for $150. A normal single\nshot pistol was $5 in New York and $40 in California. Nowhere was this\ninflation more evident than in the price of revolvers. A large-caliber Colt\nthat could be had for $38 in New York would set a Californian back $200,\naccording to one eastern newspaper. Another newspaper listed the price as $250,\nand records indicate that men paid as much as $500 for a Colt in California.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rasenberger\nseems to recognize that it\u2019s not \u201cguns cause crime,\u201d it\u2019s \u201ccrime causes people\nto buy guns.\u201d He writes of the years immediately preceding the Civil War, \u201cIn\nWashington, by one estimate, a third of congressmen went into the Capitol each\nday armed, and many of those who did so were northerners. In New York City,\nGeorge Templeton Strong noted a correlation between the rise in crime and the\nrise in gun ownership. \u2018Most of my friends are investing in revolvers and carry\nthem about at night, and if I expect to do a great deal of late night\nstreet-walking of Broadway, I think I should make the like provision.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The book\nmakes the point, \u201cUnlike a rifle, a revolver was worn close to the body, almost\nas an extension of the body, and it gave the individual who wore it the power\nto defend himself or herself (women began to carry revolvers after the Civil\nWar) against malefactors, protecting the weak against the strong and the one\nagainst the many. \u2018God made man,\u2019 went a popular western saying, \u2018but Colt made\nthem equal.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I just finished the new book \u201cREVOLVER: Sam Colt and the Six-shooter That Changed America\u201d by Jim Rasenberger.\u00a0 Some fascinating history there. Rasenberger combines a deep dive into the personality of the man who, for all practical intents and purposes, invented the revolver with a perceptive analysis of relevant social trends in America and around […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6388,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-6390","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6390"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6390\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6391,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6390\/revisions\/6391"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/MassadAyoob\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}