Judge — June 1934 — page 20: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

tion, If Robert E. Lee’s sword is valuable per se, why shouldn’t we regard our peace-time fighter’s property in the same way? Every year the police in our great cities dump hundreds of confiscated weapons into rivers and oceans. Why don't municipalities turn shrewd and auction off famous killer's tools? Wouldn’t you like to own the gun that killed Roth. stein? Can you imagine the value in the future attached to “Al Capone’s favorite revolver?” 0, WEAPON collectors are wasting time with krises, and snaphaunce muskets, and flint-locks. The first collector who gathers together the little instrument that fin- ished Jake Lingle, the sub-machine gun that Dillinger stole t from an Indiana police station, and the wooden revolver k he used to make his escape will have something that will make his gun and pistol collection important. do Meanwhile collectors would do well to eliminate Civil “T War and pre-automatic pieces from their collections unless a they mean to deal in rare exhibits. We all know that Fra: Bannerman’s and other such places can supply you with = ancient weapons. What we want to see, and what the col- * lector will find to his value, is a good representation of the size and shape and periods of weapons now used by our pr leading gangsters. *° If you can’t afford a famous gang gun you might at least a start off your collection modestly with the gun mama used a when she shot daddy, e 2 ta lo RUYS OF VARIOGS PERIODS, bs By Sigmund Rothschild . \ TIL very recently gun collectors were not so much \ dilettantes as practical gentlemen. There was hardly oi “ a place one might imagine a hundred years ago where a gun was not only decorative over the mantel but eminently practical to have at hand, Now the collector who seeks to deal in rare weapons is immediately faced with the problem of selection. Good collections rest on quality rather than quantity — Beginning with ancient sling-shots, one might assemble * weapons through the ages and have a warehouse full ot mac. “very without ever once having a single valuable piece of prop- erty. While the old double-action Colt revolvers, the long, six- ty-pound, muzzle-loading squirrel rifles, beloved by our grand-pappies and the Indian-killing carbines, have their value in American history and in collections, it seems to me most gun-connoisseurs have neglected a great classification in gun history: the modern “chopper,” “tommie,” or, in other words, the Thompson sub-machine gun. = | A light instrument that fires a hundred rounds before you can say “Dillinger,” this little daisy has been responsi- ble for more casualties than, probably, we had during the 1 ¢ | entire French and Indian wars. But have you ever seen one mounted alongside a good old Krag Crimean museum : | piece? No. Yet the “Tommie” makes history every day. Then there is another uncapitalized item in the weapon-collectors’ catalog. Mundane pieces become valuable through associa- Fro the collection of Yale & Tossa comicbooks.com