Some notes on my above post about possible meanings of NOD. 1543

The Department of the Navy in 1941 established the need for secure ordnance depots to be constructed as soon as possible around the interior of the USA. Some of the criteria was that the facility had to be a minimum of 600 miles inland from any coast to avoid capture by sea invaders, had to have east/west rail lines, and there were others.

There were sixteen (16) depots constructed by mid 1942, one of these was the Navajo Ordnance Depot outside of Flagstaff AZ. Another was Louisville Ordnance Depot in KY, but this had a different Navy designation of NOSL and was nicknamed "Gunsmiths to the Fleet". Another was Pocatello ID where 16 inch ship guns were cranked out.

Anyway. All 16 were ordnance mission specific based on the Army Ordnance mission of "delivering weapons and ammo to combat units" (or a lot of bureaucratic fancy words to that effect).

My theory is somewhat akin to the USPS, The FPO SF takes place of City and State; the NOD is like a "persons name ie: the "addressee"; the 1543 is like a "zip code". Our current zip code plus 4 is like that....5 digit zip means city and state, the plus 4 gets it in the right (hopefully) "carrier route sort" bin headed to your house.


I hope the meaning of NOD. 1543 does come to light positively so this piece of S & W revolver history can be put to rest.

__________________
Charlie B
SWCA#3083, SWHF#570