__________________
A Country Boy Can Survive

I'm guessing that ad is from around 1947?

__________________
No life story has happy end.

Well the ad says "for over a quarter century" so probably from the 30s? Maybe?

It also says over 1.5 million made. Do we know when S&W reached that number?

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

Depends on how you add up the K frames? It has to be post-WWII with its reference to Victory revolvers. The "quarter century" and "1.5 million" comments may be copied from pre-war era advertisement?? My guess is the ad was from just after the war probably 1945, since it states that orders will not be filled until next year and commercial revolvers became available in 1946.

__________________
Gary
SWCA 2515

I'm with SaxonPig on this.

"Today the Military & Police ... is again beginning to roll through the Smith & Wesson factory."

To me that means immediate post-war production starting up.

I have seen similar ads for other guns from the immediate post-war period announcing that civilian products would soon be available and to get your order in. I think they even did it for cars.

There was a huge pent-up demand for many items which weren't readily available to civilians during the war. I remember my father had to wait until the 1947 models came out to buy a new car and the local dealer demanded that my father agree to give him (not trade in) his old 1936 Chevy he had driven throughout the war to get on the list to buy.

the stocks look like pre war magnas to me with the sharp hand cut corners so the picture is probably from and early 40s ad. lee

The stocks on the one gun pictured separately are post-WW2 magnas. The stocks on the
other image, with the multiple guns projecting out of the distance, are pre-WW2 small service stocks.

The George Lawrence Co was a saddlery and harness maker here in Portland OR. The following image is their downtown building, from about 1900. As recently as 2010 or so, it was designated as a Historic Building. They made the holster and belt in the picture.



Mike Priwer

As others have stated, this is right after the war as it states in the last paragraph. The photos can't necessarily be used for dating purposes as that may have been what they had on hand from before the war.

1,500,000 is obviously an old figure as S&W has currently produced over 7,000,000 .38 M&P's.

Neat old ad and really cool leather holster and ammo belt.

__________________
James Redfield
LM #497

Another issue that supports my guess that it was an ad posted immediately after WWII. The factory probably hastily put together an ad using old data and images. The top image is a photograph, while the lower image is a drawing.

I am sure the company did not want to waste any time in getting back into the civilian marketplace.

__________________
Gary
SWCA 2515

As I read the various comments in this thread, I kept wondering if anyone other than James and Gary actually read the advertisement!!!

After making reference to wartime production, it says the M&P "is again beginning to roll through the Smith & Wesson factory." That makes it pretty clear this is a postwar ad.

Then it goes on to say, "Shipments won't be really under way until the beginning of the year . . ." so interested parties should get their names on the dealer's "waiting list." This has to be a reference to 1946 (shipments actually began to civilian markets in February, 1946). So we can comfortably place the ad historically in 1945, certainly after mid-August (VJ Day) and probably around November when the factory was finishing retooling from wartime production. These conclusions flow from actually studying the text of the ad, never mind the illustrative pictures which really don't tell us anything.

__________________
Jack
SWCA #2475, SWHF #318

To go with that ad, here's a few pictures relating to the expanding of production in 1946.

In their "Spring and Summer 1946" catalog, Klein's of Chicago, a nation-wide distributor and mail-order retailer of sporting goods, offered the M&P under "New 1946 guns". Just like the lower picture in ParadiseRoad's ad, it shows a 1930s gun, with medallion service stocks and small left-side logo.

They probably didn't have one of the new guns yet when they prepared the publication, likely in the winter of 1945/46.

Note that at that time they offered only 4 and 5 inch barrels. But by October of that year, S&W was shipping 6-inchers to them, as the letter for one I happen to own shows.

Attached Images

	kleins.jpg (110.2 KB, 14 views)
	Klein's 1946.jpg (89.4 KB, 21 views)
	letter Klein's 1946.jpg (67.6 KB, 20 views)