Don’t Use FMJ Ammo for Self-Defense Occasionally I’ll see someone using cheap, ball ammo for self defense. Sometimes this is borne out of simple frugality. More frequently it is the result of misunderstanding how modern, expanding, hollowpoint ammunition behaves. In this article I hope to convince you otherwise. Bottom line up front: don’t use…
Category: Firearms History
The Ammo Files: The .450 Bushmaster
Gunmagopedia: 450 Bushmaster In the world of straight-walled cartridges, some are better known than others. Perhaps one of the most popular straight-walled options in the rifle world is the 450 Bushmaster, a cartridge that’s known for packing quite a punch whether on steel or while hunting. This cartridge has been around for some time…
Know Your Firearms History: The ‘Tiffany Guns’ of the Spanish-American War
The ‘Tiffany Guns’ of the Spanish-American War President Joe Biden has repeatedly suggested when it was first drafted there were restrictions to the Second Amendment. He pressed the point by stating that “you couldn’t own a cannon,” while more recently he’s made the argument that the Second Amendment isn’t absolute in that Americans today…
Armed Citizen’s Corner: Review of Jim Cirillo’s “Guns, Bullets and Gunfights”
Cirillo’s “Guns, Bullets and Gunfights” Jim Cirillo was probably the last real gunfighter in America. Without a doubt the combat arms fellas in our military are gunfighters, but they ply their trade overseas. Jim did it at home, in the grim streets of New York city. He was a member of the city’s Stake…
Old School Pistolcraft: Mastering Jim Cirillo’s Technique For Coarse-Aim Shooting
Mastering Jim Cirillo’s Technique For Coarse-Aim Shooting (From the Tactical Hermit: This is one of the early uses of the “Metal on Meat” technique. Field Proven!!) Lethal-force events can happen in a split second, you need the capability to respond in kind. Here’s how law-enforcement legend Jim Cirillo got the drop on the…
Armed Citizen Corner: Rifles vs. Pistols – The Basics of Terminal Ballistics
Rifles vs. Pistols: The Basics of Terminal Ballistics For the last 100+ years, a great deal of the effort expended in ammo technology has gone toward trying to make pistol bullets act more like rifle bullets. Every few years, a new cartridge or bullet design arrives on the scene, claiming to have gotten us…
Know Your Firearms History: Lessons and Lore from Elmer Keith
Lessons and Lore from Elmer Keith For those of you who are just joining us, this “Elmer” guy is Elmer Keith, known to some as the Sage of Salmon, Idaho, and Dean of American Gunwriters to others. He was a cowboy, hunter, packer, guide, shooter, prolific experimenter, and gun writer during most of the…
Know Your Weapons: Browning’s Hammerless 1911
John Browning’s Hammerless 1911 Last year I had the opportunity to visit the John M. Browning Museum in Ogden, Utah and I was thrilled to see Browning’s hammerless 1911 prototype on display. Very little has been written about the development of this particular pistol. The pistol is briefly mentioned in John Browning and Curt Gentry’s 1964 biography of John…
Gunfight Shooting Positions: Tactics for Cars, Cover and More
Pistol Shooting Positions I have always said a shooter needs to be intimately acquainted with shooting from the GROUND. Why? I guess it’s the old grunt in me but the EARTH is you friend in a gunfight! Get close to it and Hug it! Learn to maneuver and shoot accurately from every position on…
Curio and Relic Corner: The Zastava M48 Mauser
Zastava M48 Mauser: Milsurp Gem It’s articles like these that make me want to get my C&R FFL03 License renewed so I can have that Big Brown truck of Joy deliver mil-surp weapons direct to my doorstep but I know I will never again see the glory days of ample supplies of Yugo Mausers,…