The topic about Jack Webb's guns reminded me that S&W presented a .44 to actor Raymond Burr, best known for his portrayal of lawyer Perry Mason.

Does anyone know where that gun is now? Was it engraved or otherwise enhanced?

As far as I know, it was never seen on the show or carried. I doubt that Burr was a gun enthusiast. BTW, I think he was Canadian.

Does Doc 44 know anything about this pre -29, if he sees this?

The Raymond Burr 44 Magnum was displayed at the annual meeting of the S&WCA in Knoxville, TN in 2000. It has a 4-screw frame and has Mr. Burr's name engraved/inscribed on the side plate.

I believe Mr. Burr did not keep the 44 very long and donated it (possibly) to a college or university who apparently sold it. I had a chance to buy it several years after I saw it displayed, but passed.

Bill

The Raymond Burr .44 Magnum was auctioned by Rock Island Auction within the last two years. No idea who ended up with it but it did surface.

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Bob.
SWCA 1821

If S&W should've ever presented a .44 Magnum to anyone, it ought to have been to Clint Eastwood. His Dirty Harry character popularized the Model 29 beyond any advertising or promotion the company could ever have dreamed of. He deserved the highest grade custom one that they could make, and of course, it should've been serial numbered 2211. But I can't find that any such thing ever happened.

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SWCA #590
"Colligo ergo sum"

A good man always knows his limitations. Big Larry

BTW, the actor Bill Williams, married to Della Street, Masons secretary,Barbara Hale the actress, also had a 44 S&W Magnum. Big Larry

Didn't Bill Williams play Wild Bill Hickock on TV? His name rings a bell... He may have really liked guns, unlike most actors.

Guy Madison played wild bill Hickok and Andy devine was jingles his side kick. Bill Williams played kitt Carson.

Andy Devine's character was "Jingles", I think.

Ed

And we can go further back when Andy Devine was the host of TV show The Buster Brown Show after Smiling Ed Mc Connel got fired. "Plunk your magic twanger Froggie!!!!" Seriously, I am getting REAL old. Big Larry

I'm old enough to remember that show, in fact I had a stuffed frog aptly named Froggie.

I met Mr. Devine and his charming wife in 1970 they were down to earth folks, and appeared to be pleased that I remembered Mr. Devine

Hows that for old?

Their son played the detective in the later shows and the TV "Greatest American Hero"!

Texas Star,

The Raymond Burr .44 Magnum was engraved with his name on the sideplate. It is pictured on the dust jacket of "Standard Catalog of Smith & Wesson" 1st edition, published in 1996.

This sure got off track, didn't it!

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Gunsmithing since 1961

Yes, but what to do on a Sunday afternoon? It is snowing here.
BTW, that was Froggie the Gremlin. With Midnight the cat and Squeeky. Not sure if he was a rat or hamster. I may have been 10 at the time. Rama of the Jungle was on the show as well. Old Man, Big Larry

I remember seeing an episode of Perry Mason wherein a murder victim is shot and the recovered bullet is badly mangled. The police ballistics expert testifies that he believes it came from the defendant's .357. When shown the gun on the stand, he identifies it as "a Smith & Wesson Magnum, .357." It was a black and white episode but I don't know if it was pre-57. Anyway, on cross-examination Perry gets him to admit the slug could have come from another character's .358 Norma Magnum rifle. And of course, the real killer ultimately confesses. Anyway, the Magnum, .357 used on the show was a beautiful specimen, brand spanking new.

Greg Perry

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Elmer Keith is my hero.

"Hi, I'm Buster Brown, I live in a shoe. This is my dog Teig, he lives there too."
So what did Smiling Ed do to get himself fired?

When you go down to the woods today, you better not go alone...

Since this thread has wandered off down memory lane, I'll offer my favorite Andy Devine anecdote. During the filming of STAGECOACH director John Ford, whom no one ever accused of being a nice guy, took offense at something Devine did, and shouted at him that he had no idea why he hadn't cast Ward Bond as the coach driver.

Devine just grinned. "Because Bond can't drive a six horse hitch."

didn't miss. street carry a nice pair of 38's of her own?

The ladies sure did wear tight, form-fitting clothes in those days, didn't they?

Watching those Perry Mason episodes back in the day, funny how I did not notice. I guess I must have been about six, so everybody at the time was just a grown up to me.

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You're shy a few manners.

And stepping into the time machine to go further back, we will find Andy Devine as a Shakespearean actor.

Sort of. He had a bit part in the 1936 Romeo and Juliet with Leslie Howard and Norma Shearer. "Wait for me, Juliet!"

Well no, that line wasn't in the movie. Or the play, either. Andy Devine's character was put together from two or three minor characters in Shakespeare's version. Talk about tragedies, it's too bad he never got a chance to do Lear or Hamlet.

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David Wilson

I think he would have made a better Falstaff.

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You're shy a few manners.

Thanks. I have all three editions; will go look at it. That may be where I saw it in the first place.

That isn't as far out as some TV gun "info." But he'd have had to handload the Norma magnum with a .357 Mag. bullet, to handgun velocities. Dean Grennell (?) did that in an article many years ago, to show the versatility of .35 caliber rifles.

At normal velocity and with normal bullets, the .358 Norma would make a mess of a man, and the bullet would probably exit! That round was developed to do a good job on polar bears! TV gun stuff is so unbelievable because the writers seldom know guns, and regard them as evil.

Still, that might be a believable prank, if the rifling was obscured by the mangled bullet.

Ed McConnel died of a heart attack in 1954, and the show was taken over by Andy Devine, wrapping up forever in 1955.

I saw that episode of Perry Mason last year, and as I remember it, the real killer was a handloading rifle hobbyist. I love that series; the plots, the cars, the women... I had an uncle that was dead ringer for Paul Drake, the private detective sidekick of Mason's.

they might have done that already or tried to as the writer of one films got one of the ones they used in the shooting of magnum force as a present.

actually that begs the question what kind of gun collection does eastwood have? I mean I know he was into ferrari's (namely a 275 GTB he got as part of the deal with the good the bad and the ugly and a 512 BB) but I've never really heard of him having guns outside of his films.

One last trivia on Andy Devine. One of his hobbies was amateur radio. Also a "ham operator" was Jimmy Stewart (stage name Stewart Grainger). To any hams on the forum 73's de N6DOA

I was always under the impression he is fairly middle of the road to liberal in his politics.

I don't think he is 180 degrees from Dirty Harry, but I seem to remember that one of the ironies of his judge, jury and executioner characters is that in person he is not like that.

I don't know how liberal he really is, but supposedly he has made statements that he supports a "certain amount" of gun control. According to Wikipedia, he supports the California Brady Bill. Not sure if he would be a gun owner or not but even so, you would think a Colt Walker and a model 29 would be framed on his wall for helping make him a boatload of money....

kind of strange that 44 got passed around so much Mr Burr donated it to Mc George law school who's dean was his lawyer the school was in oak park part of Sacramento CA my partner and I took it around a lot of gun shows when the dean decided that there wasn't enough security to keep on display my buddy was the dean cousin his wife the dean's ex-ast that was many moons ago that started it off

We have a Boston Bull Terrier I named Tige, remembering the old Buster Brown Shoes commercial!

One of the hottest sound tracks now available is when Smilin' Ed McConnell made a colossal ad-lib blunder. On one show when he thought the show was over and the mike was turned off, he made an off-the-cuff remark that unfortunately went out over the air:

"I guess that will hold the little ******** for another week!"

He almost got fired for that one...

John

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- Cogito, ergo armatus sum -

well given the gang problems of california and its proximity to mexico I kind of agree with the background checks thing but the 5 day waiting period is frankly just a pain in the butt.

so I wouldnt really hold that against him.

Those Perry Mason episodes featured some pretty bad gun handling. I remember one episode where this little kid's nanny let him sleep with a loaded .22 revolver - I guess she thought it was cute. When the kid's dad inevitably turns up with a gunshot wound, dead, they suspect the hapless tike. Turns out the kid's mom took the gun away from him ("Now, son..."), but left it lying on a table - loaded - by the front door! The murderer found it and shot the kid's old man.

Ahh, the 50s.

Clint was known to shoot competitively in the fast-draw games back in the 50s and 60s. I was told that he was one of the only actors who competed in a live-fire match. He was known to be a real shooter and Bob Munden said he was one of the best (behind Jerry Lewis and Sammy Davis Jr). He was also known to put a great deal mre firearms realism in his shows and movies than was standard for his day. Most any time you see Eastwood shoot the techniques, apparent recoil, and maximum number of shots fired before a reload are all realistic for their times.
I also recall reading where he said he only owned seven or eight guns. This was back in the 70s in an interview.

OK, someone hade mentioned Andy Devine.

A little trivia: "way back when", there were 3 close friends, John Wayne (The Duke), John Ford (director), and Ward Bond (Wagon Train). At Ward Bond's funeral, John Ford said to Andy Devine, "Now YOU'RE the biggest a__hole I know".

Mostly, I've posted because that last quote is too good; AND IT HAD TO BE IN PRINT AT LEAST TWICE. & How we got from Perry Mason to great quotes about Western Stars? It was worth a long read. Dino

The author of the Perry Mason series of books was a firearms rights advocate. He was Erle Stanley Gardner, and I remember that he wrote an article for gun rights that appeared in Sports Afield. He was an attorney in his own right, and from reading the Perry Mason books I could see a pretty decent knowledge of firearms that was incorporated into the stories. He made a cameo appearance in one of the last original Perry Mason TV shows as a judge.
For what it's worth, William Talman, who played the D.A. Hamilton Burger, auditioned for the part of Perry Mason.