But if that was all there was to it, a similar mystique would be attached to the Walther PPK or Beretta .25, since what man would not want to emulate James Bond in, oh, so many ways? But while those are popular, they come nowhere near the iconic Colt.
My theory is that traditional Colt single-actions, from the very first 1849 Pocket Pistol, have been beautifully designed and equally beautifully made, and to a great extent, Ruger followed that tradition with its counterparts. When I first laid eyes on a Super Blackhawk, in Larry Koller’s Guns Annual in the mid-‘60s, with its unfluted cylinder and square-back trigger guard like the 1851 Navy or Dragoon from a century before, I was smitten and I stayed smitten. I eventually got one, although it was a quarter-century later, and I’ve had one, off and on, ever since.
One thing I learned from my experience with the Super Blackhawk was that it was no fun to fire with factory .44 Magnum and, worse, I couldn’t hit much of anything. But pack it full of .44 Special, and that was a different case altogether. I could hit the odd tin can, and didn’t have to pack my wrist in ice afterwards.
Over the years, as I became interested in different handgun cartridges, I developed a yen for two things: One was a single-action chambered for the .32 H&R Magnum, and the other was for a .44 Special on a slimmer, trimmer, lighter .44 Special frame, not the much beefier .44 Magnum frame.
A .357 Magnum is simply an elongated .38 Special, and a .357 revolver can fire the smaller round. The same applies to the .44 Magnum and .44 Special. Because of this, it made eminent economic sense for companies like Ruger and, of course, Smith & Wesson, to make only the more powerful (but heavier) guns and sell them as dual purpose.
But, it seems to me, a Super Blackhawk is a bit much to carry in your tackle box, while a short-barreled .44 Special might be just the thing. Others thought the same, and a couple of large dealers persuaded Ruger to produce limited runs of the smaller Blackhawk chambered in .44 Special.
One did the same for the .32, but with unfortunate results: A full-sized Blackhawk, with interchangeable cylinders in .32 H&R Magnum and .32-20, might seem like a great marketing idea, but with its smaller bore it turned out to be even heavier than the same gun in .357 Magnum. I had one briefly, and moved it along.
Later, Ruger did a limited run of Single-Sixes in .32 H&R. It took a lot of searching, and not a little finagling, for me to finally land both a Single-Six in .32 and a Blackhawk in .44 Special, but I managed it. As life goals go, this may not be the most exalted, but it will do for the moment.
I’m having fun with them, and if a rattlesnake happens along, either walking or slithering, well, David would understand.
Gray’s shooting editor contends there’s a little cowboy in all of us (and a lot of cowboy in a few of us) and it’s nothing to be embarrassed about. We are keeping an exclusively American art form alive. And it does not mean we have to like horses.
