Marvelous. Just marvelous! I'm just speechless...

Lee, you were right about it being an NRM (non–registered magnum). Not that that detracts from the value – either in the commercial sense or the historical sense – a whit! Or maybe it is one of those “club guns,” I s’pose.

OFT, it’s no “safe queen!” Calmex says he takes it out and shoots it. And with its campaign history in the Pacific, no way to call this baby a safe queen! Who could imagine a more colorful, magnificent provenance for a gun!

N_itis, I suppose it might be one of the two 1941 guns. That's true. If so, still mighty darn cool. But I am holding out for it being the last one, the 1942 one!

Bud, I don’t know the SN. Hopefully Calmex will tell us here, or if he is concerned about it being public he can email us, for the RM data base and so we can get Roy (Roy Jinks, the S&W historian) to check it out. Plus he needs the factory letter from Roy anyway, of course (only $30, Cal) to document it properly. (Great to see you posting again, Bud, by the way. I have missed your always informative posts in your absence!)

Jeremy, good work on the Wikipedia bio. Man, this just gets better and better, doesn’t it? What a provenance!

After I posted the above info from Calmex, I went out for my morning walk and was thinking about this. With the Marine Corps and CIA background, records should be available from both organizations on Roettinger’s career. Plus the info along the lines Jeremy has turned up. And an Olympic shooter to boot! What an incredible, just incredible package Calmex has, and can further put together. What a display it would make!

Who knows, maybe if Calmex does put it all together, we could talk him into displaying at one of the SWCA meetings! Heck, I might even come over from Japan to see that!

Say, if you plug "Guatemala" and "Roettinger" into Google, all kindsa stuff turns up!