I try to read and usually enjoy the 32 caliber threads. But in all honesty, its a black hole in my knowledge base. I have a few of them and just picked up another really good condition and high number 32-20.

I'm guessing my lack of knowledge of 32s came from the fact that I was poor. OK, I felt poor anyhow. I was under a lot of bad impressions in my youth. Family history said Dad's 32 Regulation Police was sold to him by the chief of police in the nearby town back in 1925, when Dad was 14. He ran a trap line in the creek out back and didn't have a suitable weapon to carry to kill the critters. According to family lore, they had a gun. It was the family 45-70 Springfield (now in my grandson's ownership). They bought it and paid about as much for the box of 20 500 grain military shells as they paid for the rifle. But then they discovered it would kill a beef or pig just as well with a .410 shotgun shell, so they used that and saved the black powder rounds for more critical stuff. I inherited one of those rounds, but my son seems to have lost it.

So anyway, Dad needed a carry gun and the chief ponied up for the cash. These days they'd bury them both under the jail for such a transaction. Back then it wasn't even worthy of mention. He knew what my Dad needed it for, had known the family for decades. Probably a better instant check than what goes for it today.

Dad kept the gun and when I got to about 12 or so we started shooting a pellet gun down in the basement. We built a series of bullet traps, some better than others. Back to poverty. We discovered we could catch the 22 cal pellets in old couch cushions and if you fished them out pretty regularly, they wouldn't be damaged until another connected and deformed them. It allowed us to shoot for nearly nothing.

But then one day Dad smuggled down his Regulation Police. He didn't dare fire factory loads because it might set my anti-gun mother off. So we experimented (yes, with live ammo). He got some used cases he had. He never threw anything away. We deprimed them with a ground down nail and then reseated primers against a block of hardwood. Primers alone weren't very loud. But then we started loading up the cases with powder. We settled upon 1 grain of bullseye. It also was pretty economical because a pound held 7000 grains and I think back then the price on the can was $2.25. Our bullets were just 0 Buckshot. It was actually something we bought from a store. A sack of it also cost a few bucks and was 25# of fun. The problem we had was we only had about 10 empties we had to just keep on loading. One thing about that kind of shooting, you tried to make every shot count.

Something else I discovered was that I could buy gelatiin capsules up at the drug store. If you got the right size, and I can't recall it now, they would just fit the bore of my 22 pellet pistol. The best part of that was they didn't have any mass to speak of so they could obliterate a fly, but only leave a tiny grease spot where the fly vanished. And they didn't shoot very straight. That could be solved by just a drop of wax, and you could only use the bottom of the capsule. If you had any big bugs around, they'd work on them too. Think Cicadas. Interesting that my grandson discovered that the Airsoft guns will kill them with a good shot. My advantage was the capsule shattered and then the pieces were water gone with the first rain.

Last December we were downstate at the gunshow just before Christmas. A guy was pedaling an old Colt. My buddy Joe dated it as before 1923 because of the grips. We both thought it was 32 long. As soon as we couldn't chamber a 32 S&W round he knew it was 32 Colt long. I'd never even heard of such nonsense, but of course he was right. I hate it when that happens. It sent me to the books and old manuals. It seems the 32 Colt is .299 diameter. I believe you guys when you say it works with good results in a 32 S&W. But that's a lot of space between the bullets and the rifling.

And I also learned to not trust the ammo sellers. Those guys are all crooks! Before you buy a box of 32 Colt ammo, open it and look at the headstamps. A lot of it is repackaged 32 S&W. We could give them the benefit of the doubt and just figure they were stupid like me. I did find one box almost full for about $20. I'm guessing it came from the 1930s.

And just like 32 S&Ws, there isn't much difference between the shorts and the longs as far as velocity or energy goes. They're so close that I bet if somebody ran them over a chronograph they'd find shot to shot differences greater than that between the rounds.

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Dick Burg