Most of the historical recognition of Elisha Collier comes from the 1851 and 1852 patent infringement lawsuits Colt files against Wesson & Leavitt and other revolver manufacturers. Colt was claiming these other guns in fringed on his patent, and the defense argued that Colt's patent was invalid b...

I'm excited today to speak with Neil Vermillion, a US Army veteran (2002-2006) who served contracts in Kurdistan (2016) and Ukraine (2022) for the nonprofit PMC Sons of Liberty International. In Kurdistan he was a volunteer training and fighting with a group of Kurds around Erbil and Mosul. In Uk...

Patrick Phillips is back with me today to discuss the very real Japanese tactic of smuggling opium-laced cigarettes into China in an effort to undermine Chinese military resistance to Japanese invasion...

Rhett Neumayer is a guy with some really interesting and innovative thoughts on small arms training and handling. He runs Demonstrated Concepts, offering training classes on a variety of different firearms. You can check out his web site here:

https://demonstratedconcepts.com

Today, he is g...

The Midnight Brutality match was only feasible because of the assistance of the 1 Shepherd Leadership Institute cadre, and so I want to take a few minutes today to talk about just who they are. It is an organization founded in 1981 that uses infantry tactics and exercises to teach leadership. Int...

David Wirth is one of the founders of Arcflash Labs, a small company developing "ultra-high energy pulsed power supplies", which have applications in a variety of fields - but today we are talking about electromagnetic weaponry. Arcflash is currently shipping out their first batch of commercial G...

Today I'm joined by Len Antaris of Historic Investments to discuss, well, historic investments. I maintain that firearms are better bought for their historic value than as speculative investments, but there are certainly plenty of people who do both. So, Len and I figured we would discuss what we...

Today I'm again joined by Professor Ben Nicholson, author of the newest Headstamp Publishing book, Clockwork Basilisk. We are discussing the different sorts of fake and reproduction Collier revolvers, although the subject is pertinent to many other highly desirable antiques. A few of the points c...

Today Professor Ben Nicholson joins me to talk about some of the work behind the scenes to create "Clockwork Basilisk". From unexpected museum finds to Maori war chiefs, this book was the product of a whole team of researchers across several continents.

I recently met up with Ashley Hlebinsky, former curator of the Cody Firearms Museum, and we sat down for a rambling discussion about the intersection of firearms and museums, mostly. Among other things, we will talk about her consulting work with the L.A. Police Museum and the Browning family, th...

Today, a general overview of Canadian gun laws, so we Americans (and you folks across the ocean) can have a better idea of what the legal situation is in the Great White North. Please recognize that this is a general overview only - we are not getting into the nitty gritty details, and this is no...

Today I am joined for a round table discussion (well, octagon table, technically) by Jonathan Ferguson (Curator of the National Firearms Centre collection at the Royal Armouries) and Nic Jenzen-Jones (Director of Armament Research Services) to discuss a variety of improvised and craft-produced fi...

One of the collectors who offered me access to video some of his guns during my recent trip to Europe said I should do an overview of his whole collection. There is a misconception in both the US and Europe that European governments ban gun ownership. The truth is more complex - different countri...

Today I am joined by my friend Kristoffer to speak briefly about gun laws in Sweden while we take a break from the competition at Finnish Brutality 2018. As always, this is not intended to be legal advice for Swedish viewers, but just a basic overview for the edification of folks in other countries.

Larry Vickers has the closest thing most any of us will ever have to a true XM-8 rifle, and has more than a little trigger time on the original XM-8 rifles. So, I asked him to explain what the rifle was and why it failed to become the new American service rifle. It's a fascinating story that will...

Basic gun ownership in South Africa - what does it involve and how does it work? Dedicated collectors, sportsmen, and hunters? Self-dense and concealed carry? Well, when I was in South Africa I figured I'd get the scoop from a local..

Military Historical Tours is a company specializing in guided tours of battlefields and war memorials, for the historical enthusiast and veteran alike. I spent about 10 days with them visiting WW1 American battlefields in France this spring, and had an excellent time - their offerings are a great...

Today I am visiting Simpson Ltd in Galesburg, Illinois - the question we are look at is one of the most common they hear from customers: how do you tell if a Luger is all matching? When the guns were originally made, the factory put the serial number on a whole bunch of different parts, and on ma...

Today I am joined by my friend Edouard for a discussion of French gun laws, as part of our continuing series on how firearms laws vary across the world. The French system is...bureaucratic.

The M1 Carbine has long been a bit of an enigma to me, because I have never had really good luck with the design, and yet they were extremely popular with American soldiers, German soldiers, Korean soldiers, Vietnamese soldiers, and a great many other countries. So what's the deal? Is it as simpl...

Today I am speaking with Ken Hackathorn about submachine guns - specifically the Thompson and the MP5. Mr Hackathorn has an extensive resume that he is quite humble about, but I will point out that it includes being a US Army Special Forces Small Arms Instructor. He has a great deal of practical ...

Today I am joined by Mr. Stephen Petroni, chairman of FESAC - the Foundation for European Societies of Arms Collectors. FESAC is an organization set up to advocate for and protect the rights of European arms collectors at the European Union level. Here in the United States many people shrug off g...

Today I am chatting with Paul Levy of Brownells about their BRN-180 upper; a modernization of the original Armalite AR-180. This particular project is an interesting combination of recreating an older design but simultaneously modernizing it - so let's pick Paul's brain about some of the unexpect...

When I posted my video last week about some of the problems with museum firearms collections, I touched on issues that Danny Michael and Ashley Hlebinsky deal with on a daily basis. They invited me onto their weekly podcast to discuss the subject, and we decided to record the discussion on video ...