When John Browning designed his Model 1895 machine gun with it’s rotary-lever gas operation system, Hiram Maxim filed suit claiming patent infringement. Maxim had filed quite broad patents covering gas pistons operation, but specifically in […]
I wrote this paper back in 2003 or 2004 for a college class I was taking (HIST 595 – The Holocaust And Genocide). Today, it sounds a bit amateurish – but I suppose that is […]
In 1909, the Austro-Hungarian Empire announced a desire to find a new semiautomatic military rifle, and requested proposals from arms manufacturers. Six rifles were submitted to the resulting trials in 1911, including this model from […]
Norm Flayderman opened an antique gun shop in 1952, and a few years later expanded his marketing to a mail-order catalog. He would ultimately print 119 such catalogs by 1998, researching and documenting a tremendous […]
This Vickers, Sons & Maxim 37mm MkIII “Pompom” is on display at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa. The MkIII pattern is quite scarce, with less than one hundred ever made. It is built around […]
The Australian Owen submachine gun was once of the best overall SMG designs of the Second World War, and when Australia decided to replace them in the 1960s, the new F1 design have big shoes […]
Arsenals of History is an annual symposium of firearms museum, and met this year at the newly renovated Cody Firearms Museum. The theme of this year’s symposium was social media and museums. This presentation was […]
When Britain entered the First World War, it had no formal sniper program. Germany was the first combatant to train and utilize snipers, and their effectiveness quickly convinced the British military that a similar program […]
Time for another monthly Q&A! 00:18 – Guns that exceeded and fell short of my expectations? 03:14 – Why did the US keep the 1903 instead of the 1917 after WW1? 04:59 – Bren guns […]
Juan Esperanza was one of the two partners who formed the Astra company (with Pedro Unceta). When the two had a falling-out in 1925 and parted ways, Esperanza formed his own company and went on […]
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