Roy Jinks Letter ????

Register to hide this ad
RoyB said:
On November 12 of last year I sent a completed form along with a check for $50 to get a S&W Model 3 authenticated. Does it usually take this long?
Click to expand...

Last I heard, Mr. Jinks hadn't gotten to the October letters yet, so I'd say you have a ways to go.
 
Someone recently said that 4 months is the current normal wait time. One problem is that the system is probably overloaded with letter requests regarding very common guns which won't benefit very much from being lettered.
 
Last edited:
Don't knock the system. It's those letters for common guns that keep S&W contracting with Roy, as the $50 goes to S&W, not Roy. If the bottom line becomes a loss entry for S&W, it will be "Good Bye" factory letters, so tell every body to always letter their Victory Models and pre 1930s dealer shipped guns! Ed.
 
DWalt said:
Someone recently said that 4 months is the current normal wait time. One problem is that the system is probably overloaded with letter requests regarding very common guns which won't benefit very much from being lettered.
Click to expand...

I'll bet that 95% of the guns he letters do not benefit from it.
Possibly more than that.
 
The (BIG) backlog came into being while Roy was getting a new knee (near as I recall---hip maybe)---and recovering therefrom------which takes awhile. The letter requests kept on coming---and piling up. He came back to work and started on the pile----and six or eight or a gazillion other things he does.

As I recall (and this one is foggy), he said he can do about four letters per day. I'll wager more than four new letter requests arrive per day. At this point I'm tempted to suggest doing the math.

So, do the math.

Ralph Tremaine
 
Last edited:
Stay calm

I sent My request 10 Oct 2014, with every thing required, photos and all.

I received My response 6 Feb 2015.

Looks like You have about a month to go.


Lots of luck.

Al
 
Last edited:
I received my letter yesterday. It took 16 weeks. Well worth the wait.
 
DWalt said:
Someone recently said that 4 months is the current normal wait time. One problem is that the system is probably overloaded with letter requests regarding very common guns which won't benefit very much from being lettered.
Click to expand...

Please explain to me exactly what are "Very common guns"? I have a very common nickel pre War .38 M&P 4 inch, Should I get it lettered? I did. Guess what, it belonged to Harold Devine. If you don't know who he is, look him up.
 
Roy Jinks letters

I found a post by Mr. Jinks after searching this site, he said very rarely was a gun shipped to an individual, S&W sends him all over, plus his vacation time, zero help & other duties severely limit his letter lookup time. He implied if it was up to him, it would not be done. A plain letter showing shipping date to a company for models made in huge numbers will not add anything to the value of most guns, this was his opinion.
 
Club Gun Fan said:
Please explain to me exactly what are "Very common guns"? I have a very common nickel pre War .38 M&P 4 inch, Should I get it lettered? I did. Guess what, it belonged to Harold Devine. If you don't know who he is, look him up.
Click to expand...

And I have Philip B. Sharpe's K-22/40. The only reason I have it is because NONE of the prior owners bothered to get a letter. I say that with a certain degree of conviction, because if they knew the history of the gun, they'd still have it-----or the price would've been double/triple/quadruple/??? what I paid.

I reckon I might have paid double without too much of a problem, but any more than that would result in a severe beating about the head and ears administered by the BOSS LADY!! No thank you!!!

Ralph Tremaine

And having read "ol777gunnerz" most recent post above, I very likely have two dozen or more guns shipped to individuals. I also have a question----rhetorical though it may be. How do you KNOW to whom it was shipped until you get a letter-----Hmmmmmm??!!
 
Last edited:
Statistically, would anyone like to estimate what percentage of the multiple millions of S&W revolvers made over the last 150 years would have any semblance of historical significance which would be revealed by a factory letter? My guess would be maybe 0.01% absolute tops. Sure, there are many specific examples demonstrating the value of a factory letter (and some people win the Powerball lottery also). If I had any inkling that there was something odd, unusual, or historic about a gun, or if I suspected it had significant rarity or value, then I would certainly letter it. But so far, that has never happened. And probably never will. If someone thinks it's worth $50 to learn that their M&P was blued, has a 4" barrel and checkered wood stocks, and was sent to a hardware store in Mobile, Alabama on April 14, 1956, why should I care?
 
Last edited:
Club Gun Fan said:
Please explain to me exactly what are "Very common guns"? I have a very common nickel pre War .38 M&P 4 inch, Should I get it lettered? I did. Guess what, it belonged to Harold Devine. If you don't know who he is, look him up.
Click to expand...

Harold Devine? The boxer?!? Wow! That's great!
 
While location as to where the gun was shipped, and to whom, is of interest in a factory letter it is the original configuation of the gun that is of high interest to most collectors. Factory letters increase the value of certain guns merely by confirming these details.
 
ol777gunnerz said:
I found a post by Mr. Jinks after searching this site, he said very rarely was a gun shipped to an individual, S&W sends him all over, plus his vacation time, zero help & other duties severely limit his letter lookup time. He implied if it was up to him, it would not be done. A plain letter showing shipping date to a company for models made in huge numbers will not add anything to the value of most guns, this was his opinion.
Click to expand...

Please PM me with the post you read. He does now post on the public side, so, you didn't read a post from him here. I know Roy and I've never heard him say he would like to stop doing letters.
I'm calling Bravo Sierrto your comments.
 
DWalt said:
.... If someone thinks it's worth $50 to learn that their M&P was blued, has a 4" barrel and checkered wood stocks, and was sent to a hardware store in Mobile, Alabama on April 14, 1956, why should I care?
Click to expand...

Dear DWalt,
yes, indeed, why should you care? Yet you seem to care quite a bit, because frequently when this discussion about the purpose of letters comes up, you feel compelled to try to talk people out of lettering their "ordinary" guns, based on your somewhat arbitrary definition of "historical significance" and "value of a letter", which not everybody seems to share.

As far as I'm concerned, the letters are a service which Smith & Wesson advertises and wants to sell, and Mr. Jinks is engaged and paid to supply that service. I wonder how the owner of a busy store would feel if you stood outside and told people headed inside "I think you shouldn't shop here, they are really busy and overworked, they could use a break!" I don't think he'd be very appreciative. Yet that's exactly what you're doing by discouraging people from ordering letters because their guns aren't "special" enough.

Now I have nothing but the highest respect for Mr. Jinks and his work, but I would much prefer if Smith & Wesson adopted Colt's business model. It would get a lot pricier, but if I have an extra 100 bucks burning a hole in my pocket, I can have my answer in a few days, the operation is sustainable, I can actually get a discount the more guns I letter at the same time, and nobody tries to put a guilt trip on people for overburdening an old gentleman who apparently needs protecting from customers.
 
For Club Gun Fan & rct269

As one who was an actual working man, I can relate to Roy's predicament, being buried in more work than you can do while getting older each year, which makes it a little more difficult. Now everybody & his brother want a letter. Instead of knocking my post, why not start a campaign to get help for Roy in the letters dep't.?
 
Try again, wrong scan. DSCF2615.jpg Here is Roy Jinks statement on letters. I have to click the photo, when page changes, clicked again, then click return & full page pic comes up.
 
Last edited:
Absalom said:
Dear DWalt,

Now I have nothing but the highest respect for Mr. Jinks and his work, but I would much prefer if Smith & Wesson adopted Colt's business model. It would get a lot pricier, but if I have an extra 100 bucks burning a hole in my pocket, I can have my answer in a few days, the operation is sustainable, I can actually get a discount the more guns I letter at the same time, and nobody tries to put a guilt trip on people for overburdening an old gentleman who apparently needs protecting from customers.
Click to expand...
And look where Colt is today....
 
ol777gunnerz said:
Try again, wrong scan. View attachment 184800 Here is Roy Jinks statement on letters. I have to click the photo, when page changes, clicked again, then click return & full page pic comes up.
Click to expand...

Here is the original question of the referenced post:
http://smith-wessonforum.com/s-w-antiques/285905-what-value-vs-cost-factory-letter.html

Here is the full text of Roy's reply, with my bolding added:

I have asked myself this question many time, but I can letter one of mine anytime I want. It is very rare that S&W shipped to an individual, but every once in awhile even I get shocked as to who the gun went to. The period from 1857 to 1869 the guns will generally be shipped through J. w. Storrs of New York City who was S&W's sole agent in that time frame. After S&W brought Storrs into to the Wesson Firearms Co, his Clerk M. W. Robinson became the S&W Main distributor for the factory and handle 95% of all sales up the mid-1880's. Robinson also handled many of the special orders such as engraving and ivory grips. During the 1880 the number of distributor grow. To me the a couple of the key Western Distributors over looked are Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Wards as a lot of Western place ordered by mail. To let you know there is more information on the older guns than on the modern guns. The stuff that is now on computer does not provide any details like the old records. If it was my choice I would stop researching them and wasting peoples money. As to the time delay, their is only me doing the letters. If S&W sends me out on the road or I take a vacation everything stops. It generally take 10 to 12 weeks to get answer unless I have been away then it will run to 16 weeks. That is my take on the letters. Roy __________________

Roy G. Jinks
Historian, Smith & Wesson
Click to expand...
The "them" referenced that he would like to stop researching, is the modern guns that have little detail - not the old stuff. I have no idea how recent the computerized stuff is and Roy doesn't really say.

For what it's worth, I sent in letter requests for six guns back in November. These are the first I've ever sent, and I figure I ought to do it now 'cause Roy isn't getting any younger. The guns are all pre WWII, and have special features (such as target sights) that make them of greater interest. I certainly wouldn't waste Roy's limited time on any of my run-of-the-mill guns that they made hundreds of thousands of. Because I don't want to be, you know, a selfish jerk. ;)
 
I enjoy learning about my Smith & Wesson's and where they came from, etc., but, then again, most of my stuff is pre-1899. Unless you have terminal cancer or something, just be patient waiting for a letter. Besides, good things happen to folks who wait!
 
Tom K said:
I certainly wouldn't waste Roy's limited time on any of my run-of-the-mill guns that they made hundreds of thousands of. Because I don't want to be, you know, a selfish jerk. ;)
Click to expand...

selfish jerk?
for lettering a common gun?
That's a strange call.

Granpappy's 38 M&P from 1955 is not a common gun to the grandson who owns it.

A well worn 28-2 is not a common gun to the cop who carried it 30 years.

The Victory model like the one my cousin shot two enemy troops with is not a common gun.


In another thread, I said that by the 30s, S&W usually directed individuals who wrote them trying to order a gun to contact a dealer or distributor.
That was usually the policy.
However, a notable exception is LEOs.
I've seen several letters confirming a gun had been shipped directly to an LEO or a PD.
There is an Federal excise tax on new guns. A gun sent to an LEO ordered on a department letterhead for LEO duty use could be accompanied by an exemption form for that excise tax.
S&W also often gave LEOs a sweet deal on pricing.
Find a common 5" M&P or a 44-2nd shipped in 1930 or an M&P shipped in 1950 to a somewhat famous sheriff or a Texas Ranger, and you just hit the jackpot. ;)

On modern guns, if a guy wants to pay his money, he should get his letter. Maybe he wants to know if it shipped on his wedding day. :eek:
 
Club Gun Fan said:
Watchdog
I think you have him confused with Harold DeVine. He invented the boxer shorts.
Click to expand...

At first, I couldn't tell if you were serious or not. Or I wondered if maybe I was confused. After some (very brief) research, I came to the conclusion you were pulling my leg.

You and I both know I'm referring to Harold Devine, the boxer who won the Olympic Bronze Medal as a featherweight in the 1928 Olympics.
cheers.gif
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Tom K
Manufacture dates for CCI ammo lot numbers
Replies
1
Views
6K
DWalt
DWalt
M
THE Story of a S&W 1917 in .45LC the "Wimer vs Jinks" Controversy:
Replies
19
Views
2K
Bill Bates
Bill Bates
ameridaddy
Family Gone For Their Cause
Replies
26
Views
2K
Shibadog
S
C
  • Locked
Bangers 27-7 (104 made) w/Roy Jinks letter
Replies
1
Views
1K
Carmoney
C
DARE
.357 Magnum REG #657 Provenance
Replies
9
Views
2K
gc45
gc45

Latest posts

Back
Top