Question:

When S&W came out with the Registered Magnum they had to come up with a name for their new cartridge. Why was it called the .357 Magnum instead of the .38 Magnum or something similar? Wouldn't .357 sound like a smaller bullet than .38 to those folks who didn't already know that a .38 bullet was .357 in diameter?

I'd like to hear what people think the reason is.

Best,
RM Vivas

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RM Vivas
SWCA#1482L, SWHF#837

I would love to hear the genuine true history behind this also.

What I suspect is that they wanted to distance this new cartridge away from the .38 Special because it was so much more powerful.

I know that their methods for pressure testing in the 1930’s were more antiquated then compared to what’s possible today, but did they also realize that this cartridge is a full DOUBLE the peak pressure of the .38 Special?

We know and love that .357 Mag revolvers run wonderfully with .38 Special in them, but my guess is that flexibility was not a key selling point of the new cartridge and revolver, but pure brute power was the calling card and their goal was to show how new, different and “better” it was, and not to give any idea that it was similar.

.357 is the actual bullet diameter.
I figured they did not want to confuse the two

To add what others have said, they (the S&W leadership) probably also wanted to distinguish it from the many other “.38” rounds then available. .38 S&W, .38 Long Colt, .38 Special, etc. Having something different and with the Magnum moniker would be an excellent marketing point.

Adding to what Sevins and others stated. From reading Magnum by Mullin I believe Wesson sought to distinguish this new round from the .38 spl and .38/44.

Can anyone doubt that Phil Sharpe knew the pressures he was dealing with? Of course he did. He was one of (if not the) premier ballisticians of his time.

Why do you think he used the N frame .38/44 as a test bed, rather than the K frame M&P?

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Jack
SWCA #2475, SWHF #318

.38 SPL bullets are actually .357" in diameter. They are internally lubricated and fit inside the cartridge case. Legacy pistol calibers like .38 and .44 were originally externally lubricated, and the same diameter as the case, with only a tail inside, like a modern .22 LR. A .44 Magnum measures .429". Latecomer (1873) .45 Colt (and ACP) measure .454". So much for truth in advertising, 19th century style.

The term "magnum" is a champagne term. I had heard that maybe it was the president (?) of S&W who was a champagne conniseur? Magnum is the next bottle size above a fifth (750ml).

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otis

I like the champagne connection. Got me thinking about S&W's internal designation of the 44 MAGNUM, the NT-430 (bore diameter). Now that's a magnum.

Testing done on the new cartridge with the N-frame and past usage of the 38/44 as a (+P) type version of the venerable .38 Special probably led them to come up with something to both grab attention and eliminate any confusion between the three. Whatever the reasoning for the "magnum" moniker it certainly stuck for any caliber cartridge that will not chamber in its parent caliber cylinder, .38 Special-.357magnum, .44 Special-.44 Magnum which maybe they learned a lesson and failed to follow suit with .429 Magnum. A curiosity is the .41 Magnum, it didn't really follow a common non magnum cartridge. Of them all it is the only one I never had any interest in and therefore am most ignorant. Never was one to deal in compromises and I feel the .41 is a compromise. I have a friend that thinks its the neatest thing, go big or go home...I know, I know ballistics say this or that.

Doug Wesson stated, "The name is derived from the maximum diameter of the rifled portion of the barrel, measured between opposite groove areas, namely, .357 inches." Regarding the word 'Magnum', Wesson said it was defined by the English as "A greater chamber capacity than Military dimensions and power beyond the normal expectancy of the caliber."

Old timers from S&W had a different story. They always said that Major Wesson liked champagne, and he especially liked it in the large bottle called a Magnum. When the new revolver was christened, Wesson simply stated that the new large case cartridge was as good as a magnum of champagne; they liked the name and called the cartridge the .357 Magnum.

Got this from a Roy Jinks article titled "The Revolver that Changed the Direction of Handgunning."

I'm not an expert, but I know who the experts are.

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David Reynolds

I think Colt set out to confuse people. ;-)

Black powder .36 Colts use a .38 round ball or conical bullet while modern .38 Special Colts use a .36 caliber (.357) bullet.

Park in a driveway and drive on a parkway kind of thing....

Kinman up there notes they wanted to "grab attention". That they did!! Why? So they could sell something----and get the money I figure they were so desperately needing----right along with a whole bunch of other folks------smack dab in the middle of the "Great Depression".

What to do?! What to do is come up with something different---and special---so they could "Sell the sizzle---not the steak!"

So what's the special? The cartridge is the special! The gun's not too shabby either, but a gun's a gun, and this one's not much different than its kin---aside from the checkering on top. Of course you need to buy the gun, so you can use the cartridge. My very first example of the gun was an 8 3/4" beast bought by the president of a public utility in Duluth, Minnesota---and he for damn sure was going to test out that cartridge-----had the gun sighted in at 100 yards with Magnum ammunition!! And what'd he do with it? He took it home, and put it in his sock drawer---and there it stayed until his heir put it in his sock drawer----'cause it was something special! And then I got it----'cause it was something special.

And sell the sizzle is exactly what they did------and it worked! You can tell it worked by the fact they weathered the storm, and they're still here.

Now I can go on and on with some facts and figures to show you the whys and wherefores, but they've been presented to you before by a true scholar of the times. He caught my attention right off, so much so that I went off with a heightened awareness of the fact all this wasn't so much about a new cartridge and a new gun as it was about how to keep on keeping on!

Ralph Tremaine

Why wasn't the 38 Spl called the .357 Minimum?

"I'm not an expert, but I know who the experts are."

Remember...An Ex is a has been, and a spurt is a drip under pressure!

I thought it was called an .88 Magnum, and shoots through scholastic buildings...

As I have said, the heaviest .36 Caliber revolver I ever held was a 357 Ruger RedHawk.

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NRA LIFE MEMBER

Same reason the .40 S&W is called the Forty Short and Weak?

Easy read on the .357 Magnum here.

.357 Magnum - Wikipedia

Johnny Dangerously...Now what did I do with that DVD?......Ben

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Cogito, ergo BOOM!...

Legend has it that Elmer Keith blew up more than one pistol in developing the .357mag round.

I bet he said some adult words afterwards...............

Yup- I toned-down the quote for the censors...

Dig Dan Wesson up and ask him.

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S&W Accumulator

I suspect legend has become a bit confused with the passage of time. Philip B. Sharpe is the gentleman S&W credits with the development of the 357 Magnum cartridge --------and he didn't blow up any guns. He did scare the pants off of Doug Wesson with some of his experiments along the way, but Wesson survived, as did the 38-44 Outdoorsman given to Sharpe as a test bed. Later on, when the patting on the back was in progress, Wesson gave Sharpe another gun----Registered Magnum #2.

Actually, Sharpe was the recipient of more than a few gifted guns. One of them was a 22/40 that lived here for quite a spell. I didn't know the first thing about all that when I bought it, not until the letter arrived. The Boss Lady says I was in need of some calming medicine when that showed up!

Ralph Tremaine

Actually, an expert is anybody who's more than about 50 miles away from home!

Ralph Tremaine

I believe Phil Sharpe suggested the name 38 Special Magnum, or something similar.

Kevin

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Unshared knowledge is wasted.

38 Special Magnum is correct---as are a couple others: 38 Special Experimental, and 38 Sharpe Magnum. All these are shown as labels on photos of entrance and exit holes in bars of soap.

Surprisingly enough, Sharpe was also fooling with a 44 Sharpe Magnum----just a little ahead of time------and making A LOT bigger holes!!

Ralph Tremaine

It was namely to diversify the new cartridge from a litany of other cartridges dubbed as .38cal, despite the fact that they were all actually .35, .36, or even .40cal in the case of .38-40.

.38 Short Colt
.38 Long Colt
.38-40
.38 S&W
.38 Special
.38 ACP
.380 ACP
.38 Super

The list goes on and on...

.357 Magnum was named to more accurately represent the diameter of the projectile, breaking away from an old, outdated naming convention which was formerly accurate when applied to old heeled bullets, but had since been inaccurately applied to several other cartridges for no better reason than marketability.

Ultimately, I believe it was a good call, as I doubt the ".38 Magnum" would have caught on very well in a market flooded with ".38s".

It's the same reason why .460 S&W isn't just ".45 S&W Ultra-Mag" or something, despite the fact that in this case, .460 S&W is in fact a .452 caliber bullet, same as so many other .45cal cartridges, including .454 Casull.

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Shooting Comfort is bilateral.

Not to change the subject, but the biggest scam in the ammunition world is "+P".

Ralph Tremaine

I wonder if his mom ever got that operation?

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Even older, even crankier....

All good answers!

I always figured it was because as a new cartridge for anew revolver, S&W wanted to break with the old and embrace something completely new.

In correspondence between Guilford Hartley (RM#702) and DBW dated 09MAR36 DBW states:

''....I was very much pleased to receive your letter of March 5th and to hear that your Magnum Registered #720 is living up to what we say about it; as a matter of fact, I cannot conceal the fact that I consider it to be by far the finest hand arm that has ever been produced.

The published calibre sizes of revolvers are all very curious and have no real bearing on the bullet diameter; for example, the .32 S. & W. Long has a bullet diameter of .313, while the .38 S. & W. Special has a bullet diameter of .357. When we were looking for a name for this new and most powerful arm it occurred to me that it would be quite novel and arouse quite a bit of interest if we should refer to the actual bullet diameter, and for that reason we hit on the name of .357 Magnum. Personally, I feel that for some reason or other that sounds much more powerful than 38...."

So it seems that ".357" was chosen as a name because it was "quite novel and (would) arouse quite a bit of interest if we should refer to the actual bullet diameter".

Info courtesy of S&W Historical Foundation (you -are- a member, aren't you?) #DVD1_11-19-2009\0\4\4523.tif

Best,
RM Vivas

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RM Vivas
SWCA#1482L, SWHF#837

A few people at the SWCA Tulsa show mistakenly called me an expert in some field or another and my response was that an expert is a fellow who knows exactly -ONE- more fact than everybody else!

Kind like you only have to be right %51 of the time to be a gifted weatherman!

Best,
RM Vivas

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RM Vivas
SWCA#1482L, SWHF#837

There is only evidence of one revolver that Elmer Keith blew up, and that was a .45 Colt Single Action Army.

Elmer Keith had nothing directly to do with the .357 Magnum. It was a joint development of Smith & Wesson, Winchester and Phillip B. Sharpe. There is a full chapter devoted to the .357 Magnum in "Complete Guide to Handloading" written by Phillip B. Sharpe. Buy a copy if you really want to know the history of the cartridge and revolver!

The bottom line is the cartridge was called the .357 Magnum because Major Daniel B. Wesson, president of S&W at the time of its development, named it that! The explanation of the case being large for caliber, like a magnum of Champagne, has been around for a long time and is likely his motivation for the name.

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Gunsmithing since 1961

The .375 H&H was the first designated 'magnum' cartridge in 1912. So we can only credit developers of the .357 magnum for using the designation in pistol rounds. Incidentally, theirs was one of the few magnum rifle cartridges that actually needed a belt for headspacing due to the tapered case with an indistinct shoulder. Later, manufacturers put belts on any magnum cartridge. In Speer #9 they say that the belt on most magnum cartridge are there for 'eye appeal', but I think it's more for 'mouth appeal' as telling someone that you were shooting a 'belted' magnum was considered the ultimate in redneck parlance.

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"He was kinda funny lookin'"

Remember the .357 case is longer than the .38 Sp's.

So the Fifth vs Magnum analogy makes sense IMHO

S&W probably wanted to differentiate the new round from the .38/44 Super Police and other Hi-Speed .38 Special cartridges. Calling it the .357 Magnum did that and also allowed the company to register the name with the U. S. Patent Office.

Bill

It's been a while since I've read Keith's story on the .357mag work he did. As I recall (keep in mind I'm old) Keith did his work totally independent of Smith. I'm sure they were aware of each other & so forth.

Seems like Smith did invite Keith to the introduction to the new gun/caliber. I also recall they gifted him one of the first few made.

I need to get Keith's book, so I don't have to rely on my faulty memory...............

Go on..................

Why .357 Magnum? Sales.

If they'd thought calling it "Winnie the Pooh" would sell more, Winnie it would be...

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Pisgah

Many years ago Mel Brooks said it so wisely..... Merchandising. That is loosely by definition any practice which contributes to the sale of a product to a retail customer/consumer.

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NRA Endowment Member

Elmer Keith to D. B. Wesson in 1935..."you are going to have one hell of a demand for this gun in 44 caliber". Also, Phil Sharpe tested a .44 Sharpe Magnum along with his .38 Sharpe Magnum. It was a 242 grain hollow point at 1150 fps muzzle velocity. We could have had the 44 Magnum in 1935 . Now that would have been something!!!!!!!!!!

Bill

IIRC when it was introduced in 1935 the Registered Magnum sold for $60.00-a month's pay for many-if they had a job.
Also part of the advertising campaign was because of its power the .357 was recommended for men of larger and more muscular physique.

I understand that police needed a more powerful cartridge to penetrate automobiles, in the age of Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde, and others. The round is quite manageable in a full-sized revolver. It didn't hurt its popularity that Patton adopted one along with his Colt SA.

I haven't fired .38 SPL, including wadcutters, in over 50 years. You gotta' shoot what you carry.

Calling it something other than 38 magnum should have prevented many from wanting to rebore their old M&P's.

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Front sight and squeeze

I thought you'd never ask!!

Okay---in the beginning:

Truth be known, I can't speak to the real beginning simply because I don't have any reference material from the beginning----------so we'll go from along the way.

Along the way starts in 1925---thereabouts.

In 1925, the muzzle velocity of a 158 grain .38 Special round was 858 fps. (The 158 grain round is chosen because that's the only one they had at the time---or at least the only one I have data on--and it comes from a S&W catalog.)

Okay---then, at some other point along the way, that round was downloaded. I don't know when, or why, but I know what it is today---755 fps.

Then---our salvation--HALLELUJAH!!!!--- today's + P version: 890 fps.

Let's see now---we start off at 858, drop to 755, and then go all the way back up to 890---WOW!!!!

It is at this point we should probably say a few words about fishing tackle. Most folks will probably tell you fishing tackle is made to catch fish. I will tell you it's made to sell to fishermen. The analogy here is +P came to be following the realization by the ammo companies that there were A BUNCH of concealed carry permits being issued across the country. The more astute among those observers said, "You know what?!! I'll bet we could make a ton of money if we came up with an uploaded product---put it back to about where it was before it wasn't, give it a catchy name, and sell it to these newly minted gunfighters---at an appropriately increased price of course!"

And damned if it didn't work!!

Of course that was quickly followed by "New and Improved" guns---those "Rated for +P"------------never mind those not rated for +P will do just fine with it!! And that, of course, is because these ammunition folks' Momma's didn't raise no dumb kids; and they know full well if their product damages anybody's property or injures a user, those sneaky lawyers out there are going to sue the pants off of them---AND they're going to win those suits without even breaking a sweat!!

Thanks for asking!!

Ralph Tremaine

The rather interesting--or telling---maybe even shocking thing about that $60 price tag is it cost them $17 to make the gun!!

Well, they needed the money, dammit---and you can't blame them for trying----especially because it worked!!

Ralph Tremaine

Phil Sharpe had a lot to do with the .357's development as did many others. Elmer Keith's part in the development of the 357 Magnum, this is what he said in "SIXGUNS". "Next we have the .357 Magnum Smith & Wesson cartridge. I worked with Doug Wesson on this development and sent him the first Keith bullets used in developing the load." S&W sent him an early prototype for testing and he published an article in the April? 1935 "AMERICAN RIFLEMAN".

I know what S&W said on the invoice (below )when they sent him his 4" 1950 Target.
"Mr. Keith.......assisted in the development of the .357 Magnum cartridge."

Attached Images

S&WEKinvoice44spl.jpg (44.3 KB, 40 views)

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PTLAPTA!

Never read that in any of his writing. Must be some more lying legend. He blew up three revolvers that I am aware of and possibly one more . I know he had two Colt SAA .45 Colt's let go on him and the pot metal break top that he was asked to shoot for someone else . I think there was a third SAA in .45 that he just cracked the barrel on but I could be confusing two versions of the same blow up . Somebody may have blown up some revolvers developing the .357 Magnum but Elmer was not one of them.

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Grumpy Old Man With a Gun

Three for sure and maybe a fourth. Two Colt SAA's in .45 Colt and maybe a third , with his reloads. A break top that belonged to a friend with factory ammo supplied by the friend. The SAA's caused him to quit the .45 Colt for the thicker cylinder walls of the .44 Special. The break top caused him to swear off on anything cheap. The first .45 was the one that busted the cylinder and blew the top strap on a balcony of the room he was staying in. The second and maybe a third was due to using a 300 grain 45-90 bullet sized to .454 ahead of a heavy dose of #80 . It blew the loading gate off cutting Elmer's thumb and cracked the forcing cone in three places. I think there was one other involving the same bullet cracking a forcing cone but am not 100% certain as it may be the same gun just told different. All are from Elmer's writing , not legends someone else started.

Elmer supplied Wesson his bullet for the .357 Magnum and they actually used a hacked up version of it ,a modified Sharpe bullet based on Elmer's bullet . I think Elmer's part in developing the .357 Magnum was more in his work on the .38-44 loads.

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Grumpy Old Man With a Gun

Elmer Keith was sent .357 Magnum, Club Gun Serial Number 0362, in July 1935. The gun was a test revolver that had been heavily used. I believe he published his experiences with the new cartridge and how it compared to his heavy .44 caliber loads in the American Rifleman later that year. While Elmer praised the new cartridge and revolver, his first choice was always in .44 caliber. Those of you who have purchased, "THE SMITH & WESSON MAGNUM EDITION", can see two great photos of Elmer Keith's .38/44 Outdoorsman used to develop heavy loads in .38 caliber on pages 10 and 11.

Bill