Smith Wesson factory letter for 1942 victory Model

[jeeps]

It came back shipped 1942 to Ohio Electric Manufacturing company Cleveland ohio to guard there plant. I do not know what they made for the war. Research is hard. It does not look used at all. Not even smokes rings on front of cylinders.

 

[Muss Muggins]

Lots of Victory models went to industrial sites on the home front considered vital to the war effort. Nice find . . .

 

[jeeps]

White half tracks, and GM tank plant and steel plants too. Ohio was a big warplant area industries.

 

[Absalom]

Large companies, especially utilities like this, always had security guards not just during wartime, but also before. Since at that time no civilian or commercial handgun orders were possible, all such orders had to go through the DSC. And just like the saying went with the old black Model T Ford, you could get any gun wanted as long as it was a Victory; well, maybe if you were patient, a Colt Commando, but Colt was always unable to meet production deadlines on those.

So I think a power company would have no problem ordering guns for its security department through the DSC without expending too much effort proving it's essential to the war effort.

 

[deyomatic]

It says "Ohio Electric Manufacturing Co." I doubt that is a utility- I think you are correct, that it is most likely a factory that made things for the war effort.

 

[Ron M.]

Congrats! Mine was delivered to Kobe International in Huntington Park, CA in June, 1942. Letter indicated everything was totally original. Well worth lettering. Hard these days to find an unmolested Victory in .38 Special that's original. Perhaps, the next Holy Grail of S&W revolvers?

 

[jeeps]

Was it worth a letter,heck yes! A local war industry. What did they make? It must have been important. The Victory I traded a Glock for to the son of the father who passed it to him. He had no interest in it,but wanted a Glock. He was in his 60's his father passed.

 

[Absalom]

Lifting magnets and electric motors. Wasn't too hard to find out.

It's hard to appreciate how total the mobilization for the war effort was once the war got going, especially manufacturing. Ford's Willow Run aircraft plant alone, which built B-24 Liberator bombers, had over 10,000 sub-contractors delivering tools, machines, parts, and sub-assemblies. And all of them were ultimately essential, even if they didn't built tanks or guns. That's why they called it home front. As I've mentioned before, I have seen a letter for a Victory that went to the Hershey Chocolate Company.

 

[jeeps]

You never know some company's made stuff for the Manhattan project.

 

[opoefc]

Jeeps, Congrats on your nice find. I think the Defense Supply Commission shipped Victory Models are an overlooked segment of S&W collecting, and once you find out the destination, more research on what role it played in the war effort/production can be very revealing. One of my early finds in a DSC gun, was one shipped to Warner Bros. Studios, Hollywood, CA., c/o Cap't Jack Warner or Lt. Ronald Reagan, 1st War Training Film unit. Some of these DSC guns were also original 2 in. barreled guns - super rare! Ed.

 

[Club Gun Fan]

Recently while lettering a DSC Victory, I took a few seconds looking at destinations of others. I saw one that went to a Detective Agency in Chicago, two sent to Boeing and one to Harley Davis. I'm sure that should have read Davison, but, it was listed as Davis.

 

[DWalt]

A year or so ago, I found a book on the remainder rack at Dollar Tree called "Victory's Forge" I don't remember the author, and I gave the book away after I read it. It is an amazing history of mobilization of U. S. industrial production for total war. The book gives the most credit to two individuals, William Knudsen and Henry J. Kaiser, for the WWII production miracle, and it was nothing short of a miracle. Knudsen received one of the first Victories off the S&W production line.

 

[Absalom]

A year or so ago, I found a book on the remainder rack at Dollar Tree called "Victory's Forge" I don't remember the author, and I gave the book away after I read it. It is an amazing history of mobilization of U. S. industrial production for total war. The book gives the most credit to two individuals, William Knudsen and Henry J. Kaiser, for the WWII production miracle, and it was nothing short of a miracle. Knudsen received one of the first Victories off the S&W production line.

I think you are referring to "Freedom's Forge" by Arthur Herman. A great read. I have it on my Kindle. I'm pretty sure I got the number of 10,000 subcontractors for Willow Run, which I quoted above, from that book; he goes into fascinating detail about all the great production projects.

 

[DWalt]

You are right- Freedom's Forge. As I said, I gave it away some time ago and forgot the title. Without the likes of Knudsen and Kaiser, Arnold, Patton, Eisenhower, Halsey, and Nimitz would have had nothing with which to take the war to the enemy.