I see messages posted about the Terminator being attributed to Lew Horton. I emailed them about it, and am posting their response with their permission:
****************Start of pasted text***************************
Hello LC '92!
I occasionally get a question on these. I know there are posts in Wikipedia and on the S&W Collector’s Forum that attribute the Astra 44’s to us. I have no available documentation that supports the Wikipedia and Forum posts. It is possible that those guns were imported in the early 80’s, prior to Lew Horton’s installing our automated gun record system. My automated records go back as far as 1984. To research, we’d have to go back to our paper records, and that’s a service we do not offer.
Sorry I could not be of more service on this one.
Earl Minot
Lew Horton Distributing
Ph: 800-446-7866, ext 230
Fax: 508-366-5332
[email protected]
Lew Horton Distributing Co. Inc.
***************End of pasted text************************************
Anybody for sure know when these were made? My serial number starts with an R3 but the Astra serial numbers chart doesn't list an A3 date. It shows R, R1, and R2 as 1947, 1973, and 2000 respectively.
I wonder if Jon Jovino imported these and sold them through his shop. He was already making them in house and had an existing market and an installed base of them. Wish I hadn't gotten rid of my old Gun Digests, I could easily have looked this up.