AMERICAN HANDGUNNER MAGAZINE EXCELLENCE!

I've been a longtime reader of magazines, as I've mentioned before, and although the internet is a dream to a reading junkie like me, a short term attention span type of reader, who would rather read in-depth articles rather than drawn out books on most counts nowadays.

My legal research professor in law school predicted a demise of pleasure book reading when I was in law school, and although I told him he was foolish then, it appears he was right. I read the occasional book, but voraciously read all kinds of online and print magazines and forums.

Most of my reading interest revolves around my hobbies and interests. Music. Drumming. Shooting. Self defense. Outdoors experiences. And fishing. Heavy on the fishing. As a good friend said about me, "you'd fish in a sink with 6" of water in it if someone told you there were fish in there". And that's about true. I have uttered that very question, "are there any fish in there" toward waters large and small all across the country, from the Congeree River near Columbia, South Carolina to the Pacific Ocean and streams and rivers and lakes and creeks and saltwater bays and oceans and gulfs in between.

So most of my magazine purchases or subscriptions are to these areas. Every now and then some screaming deal $5 a year for 3 magazines fund raiser comes along and I'll get something interesting like The Week or WIRED for awhile for a couple of dollars a year.

In addition to reading American Handgunner on a frequent basis, I also read Combat Handguns and The American Rifleman. I'm a newstand browser of many other gun mags, and every now and then if there are a bunch of articles I'm interested in I might grab one of those, two or three times a year.

Yet in all of my magazine reading, which has given me a great database of gun and shooting information that only myself and a few friends care to share and discuss, I've never felt the need to contact a magazine.

But a few weeks ago, after reading a nice article on Big Bore Snubnoses by Mike "Duke" Venturino in American Handgunner, wherein there was a picture of a converted to snubnose Model 1917 Smith and Wesson that belongs to the Editor of American Handgunner, a Mr. Roy Huntington.

I wrote a brief email to Roy, told him what I did for a living and the Model 1917 that I was thinking about converting to a NICE snubnose conversion, and sent that email the Sunday night after Christmas to his company email. I asked for info on who did his conversion, what kind of front sight did he fit on the gun, who he would recommend and what he would do different.

The next day, Roy replied with a solid recommendation, a fellow I've heard much about who does charge reasonable prices for the work he does, which is reknowned as excellent. I had not thought of Roy's recommendation in my searching for a wheelgunsmith specialist, but it all made sense once his name was recommended by Roy.

I found out that Roy did his own conversion, milling his own sight design for the gun. If you read the article over at the Handgunner website, the Model 1917 I speak of is on the 2nd page of the article and clearly labeled as Roy's gun. It is functional but gorgeous as heck.

So Roy further suggested having the grip frame reduced to accept "K" frame grips. He also suggested a fine looking nickle or chrome finish, certainly a plus here in hot and humid Texas.

Roy was full of ideas, and so he earned himself a subscription to his magazine from me. It's a thick magazine, with glossy and thick pages, and to me it's the nicest magazine in production in terms of construction and style. It's good paper and reads nice and feels nice and is durable and the pictures are just very vivid. Think digital v. analong.

In any event, I salute any business whose leader will take the time to help a fella out. Like me, Roy was also a police officer, but I don't know the details of his career as either a writer, editor or police officer.

American Handgunner features many of my favorite writers, and it's one of the few magazines where there is more than a token effort towards recognizing revolvers and wheelguns. Although I love my semi-autos, I likes my wheelguns too, and lately there have been a lot of wheelgun features in AH.

Thanks for the information, Roy. I think the K frame grip reduction would be the shi-zazzle-zizzle for that particular gun to be a carry gun.