picked up this old gal today along with the old Remington's in the photo

she is going to be one of the last ones of these they made. so circa 1937

locks up tight, with mother of pearl grips, sadly the right side grip is cracked

Nice guns! If you take some Superglue and run a very fine bead in the crack and immediately sand the area with a 300-400 grit sand paper the pearl dust and Superglue will form a filler that will both bond and fill making the crack stronger and less noticeable. I have even filled chips this way. Oh as a side note I have many relatives in Hart co Horse cave area. I live in Portland Tn.

Did you have a letter with that 32 Safety, 3rd Model? Just curious, since that date sounds very late for this model. The Latest ship date in the SWCA database is 1929 with serial number around 240,000. They are fun shooters at the range.

You can find pearls in eBay quite often if you wanted to replace the cracked stock. They are not high priced, since they are not original S&W factory stocks.

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Gary
SWCA 2515

no letter I was using data from the blue book and the standard catalog of firearms, they both show 1937 as the last year and it is very close to the last posted serial number for the model

Thanks. Vintage S&W revolvers are typically dated by their shipping date and antique status is also defined by when a S&W was shipped rather than by when it was manufactured. Also, the factory did not ship guns in serial number order, so your revolver could have shipped a few years one way or the other from 1937.

Manufacturing dates are problematic for me, since typically the frame was manufactured in large batches and finished, it then received a serial number. That frame probably joined hundreds of others in a parts bin until someone assembles the gun. It also seems likely the finished gun remained in inventory without the stocks until it was randomly pulled and completed for shipping. I have seen lots of guns that were made, for example, in the 1910s with matching s/n stocks from the 1920s era. So when it was actually manufactured is up for interpretation. Factory letters are the only way to be sure about the age of any S&W.

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Gary
SWCA 2515