The ultimate Highway Patrolman thread.including N frame ser# ranges

I was given a 28-2 N267xxx by a friend who owed me a little bit of money some years back. It was nickel plated at some point in its life. The nickel was fading in places really bad and flaking at the muzzle. Shoots great. But after holding onto it for a number of years, a friend gave me a gift certificate to Fords to get it restored to its original HP blue. Fords tells me they are about to ship it to my FFL, so I will post follow up pictures. Until then, I have a not great picture below. The magnas are not original to the gun--I got it with rubber Hogues.
 

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I picked up my first 6" HP today at my local store, transfer from a Gun Broker win. It's a later 28-2, SN N5800XX. '79 or '80 manufacture? It will be my Christmas present from my wife. I got to see it for a few minutes today. Made sure it was good, it was absolutely as advertised. Not a blemish or wear spot on metal, other than turn line. And a single scratch/smudge on one of the stocks. Pic's are of both as received and after a quick coat of CLP before I wrapped it in parchment paper and stowed it away in the safe, not to be opened until Christmas.

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I don't think I have added this one. I picked it up a few months ago. it is my second 1954 highway patrol, I rescued this one from a pawn shop, now it needs a set of grashorn stags,,,,,,,,,,,
 
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I think I have this one buried in this thread somewhere, it is my 4in first year highway patrol I hope it is worth seeing again. I know there are folks on here that are real collectors and put my meager collection to shame, but I still love to show the ones I have. this was my first HP I traded it to a friend and he kept in his safe a year and never took it out. I got a chance to bring it back home and it will never leave again!
 
Here is my contribution to this thread:

S/N: S18890x Four Screw

According to its letter: "Shipped from the factory on March 30, 1959 and delivered to Union Hardware & Metal Co., Los Angeles, CA. Shipped with 6 inch barrel, brush blue finish, and checkered walnut grips. Records indicate that this order was for 10 units in this configuration. Target grips were added after being originally shipped from the factory."

Any thoughts on this 10-revolver order, the hardware store, or what agency in CA might have used this revolver would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
 
Alan52 said:
Here is my contribution to this thread:

S/N: S18890x Four Screw

According to its letter: "Shipped from the factory on March 30, 1959 and delivered to Union Hardware & Metal Co., Los Angeles, CA. Shipped with 6 inch barrel, brush blue finish, and checkered walnut grips. Records indicate that this order was for 10 units in this configuration. Target grips were added after being originally shipped from the factory."

Any thoughts on this 10-revolver order, the hardware store, or what agency in CA might have used this revolver would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
Click to expand...

I maybe way off base but being an old Bullseye shooter and the mention of target grips added my mind goes right to 50's era shooting matches. I wonder of the LA Police Dept had a target shooting team. Somewhere on youtube, a few years ago I watched an old 50's era film which showed folks shooting Bulleye type matches at a range. If memory serves me (and it doesn't as well these days), I believe there were both police and civilians at the range and I only recall seeing them shooting revolvers. It also showed them collecting and processing the fired .38SPL brass, casting bullets and reloading ammo for future matches, I wouldn't have a clue what terms to search for now, I stumbled across it while looking at gun videos. It may possibly have been an old NRA or police dept video, possibly...

You might try searching LA county clerk records if they are available online, many counties now have records available online where you can look up deeds. You might be able to find out who owned that hardware store, from there see if you can find family members who might have some info and maybe even remember that order. Or contact the police dept's in the area and see if they had teams within the dept, might get lucky and get someone who likes to chat target matches or ask if they have anyone who acts as a dept historian. If they went to a law enforcement dept, even for target shooting I would think they would have been marked "Property of XYZ Dept." but then again maybe not if they were never issued for carry or if each officer paid for them just for target shooting.

Please let us know what you find out!
 
Well this was bugging me, I found a colorized version of that old video in the middle of the night. It was farther back then I remembered, 1938. Note, don't try some of these shooting skills at home, You'll shoot your eye out kid!
(Copy and paste link if you want to download it --> youtube.com/watch?v=jDP8BRSEjrA )

ETA: You'll see my memory is not as reliable as it use to be, no civilian shooters and it appears there were some 1911's (?) being fired toward the end, the video is not quite as I remembered. (Has anyone seen my keys?)

[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDP8BRSEjrA[/ame]
 
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Alan52 said:
Thanks for posting this. I don't care how good of marksman my co-workers are, I'd never trust them enough for some of those shots. :)
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Yeah, Amen to that! Did you notice where the officer had the chalk sticks in his ears? Did you see how close the shot to the left was! Yikes! "Oops, sorry about that" just wouldn't cut it!

OK, back on topic, I'm going to get in trouble for derailing the thread. To the admins, if you want to delete these posts please PM me first, I'd like to start a new thread first where folks can continue chatting this topic and just post a link here to redirect folks, or you can start the thread and move the posts. Or just delete them all together, it's your forum! Sorry about going off topic folks....
 
GWW said:
She looks nice! I gotta ask, what is that object in the upper left of your pic, just above the other muzzle?
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Thanks!

That's my illuminating loupe to help check numbers without removing the stocks.
 
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While I love the magna's on the four inch, they just weren't working out on the six inch HP. I was shooting better with the shorter barrel, just better balanced for me. My $86 targets from ebay were delivered today and I'm confident they're going to help my shooting with the longer barrel.

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Hello to everyone on the thread here; I stumbled onto a Nickel version of the Highway Patrolman yesterday. This one is a 28-2 # N1894xx, in 6 inch , Target stocks, counterbored cyl, Pinned barrel. no insert in the ramp front sight.

I think the rather unique point on this particular piece is the Model 28-2 stamping on the frame was struck twice!

I will try and get some decent pictures of it to share with everyone here on the forum.
 
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