The J Edgar Hoover 22 “registered magnum” ??

M

Model29-26.5

Silver Supporter
Joined
Mar 13, 2024
Messages
1,420
Reaction score
2,624
Location
Nashville TN
What would this be worth? Ballpark?

What is currently known about it or its possible whereabouts?

If you saw it in a pawn shop and picked it up for $800, either knowing what you were buying and concealing your excitement, or discovering what it was after you got home…. what would be your next immediate action?
 
Register to hide this ad
Mr. Hoover was given a .357 Magnum with Registration number 1. The Magnum was delivered to D. B. Wesson for presentation to Mr. Hoover. The revolver has an 8 3/4-inch barrel, blue finish, 1/10-inch Patridge front sight, rear sight to match, sighted in at 20 yards with .357 Magnum ammunition, 6 o'clock hold, grip adapter attached.

There was a pair of Registered .357 Magnums with an 8 3/8-inch barrel that was ordered by a mining company in California for a patron. One was in .357 Magnum caliber and the other in .22 Long Rifle caliber. The latter cost $150 (approximately three times the cost of a Registered Magnum) if I remember correctly. Collectors have searched for this pair for many years, but it has never been located. This is the only Registered Magnum chambered in .22 LR.

Bill
 
Model29-26.5 said:
From what I have read, S&W presented him with a pair or revolvers.
A registered magnum in 357, and a "registered magnum" chambered in 22 LR that (so I just read) stamped "22 Colt" on the barrel?
Click to expand...
I do not believe this is correct.

Mr. Hoover received REG. 1 (8 3/4 inch barrel) as a personal gift from Doug Wesson.

The single 22 LR RM was part of a special order for two RMs, one in 22 LR and the other in .357 Magnum. The order was placed by the American Potash and Chemical Corporation. The 22 has never been located. I am not sure about the consecutive number in .357.
 
Doc44 said:
Mr. Hoover was given a .357 Magnum with Registration number 1. The Magnum was delivered to D. B. Wesson for presentation to Mr. Hoover. The revolver has an 8 3/4-inch barrel, blue finish, 1/10-inch Patridge front sight, rear sight to match, sighted in at 20 yards with .357 Magnum ammunition, 6 o'clock hold, grip adapter attached.

There was a pair of Registered .357 Magnums with an 8 3/8-inch barrel that was ordered by a mining company in California for a patron. One was in .357 Magnum caliber and the other in .22 Long Rifle caliber. The latter cost $150 (approximately three times the cost of a Registered Magnum) if I remember correctly. Collectors have searched for this pair for many years, but it has never been located. This is the only Registered Magnum chambered in .22 LR.

Bill
Click to expand...
Thank so much!
In writing this post, I came across a post from 2013 where you gave this information about a gentleman in Trona.
I am familiar with this area, and the Trona pinnacle, which are very close to Death Valley.
Somebody also said they knew where it was? I'm not sure if they were kidding or not..
I always wondered about a 22 in an N frame.
Unnecessary, of course, but that is not the point.
This 22 RM, and the actual Dirty Harry 29 used in the opening credits of "Magnum Force" would be my two grail guns.
 
The Model 29 used by Clint Eastwood in "Magnum Force" is in the NRA museum. Jim Supica, Former Director of the Museum, brought the gun to Tulsa a number for years ago for Show & Tell at the Southwest Bunch meeting there during the Tulsa Arms Gun Show. I had a photo of me holding the 44, but the photo was lost when the photo hosting site I was using suffered a catastrophic fire many years ago.

Collectors have posted want ads in local papers offering a reward for information about the .22 "Magnum", but nothing was ever learned about it.

Bill
 
I trust the research staff at Rock Island Auctions when things exceed my expertise (which is a pretty low bar ;))

Here is what they have to say, which pretty much backs up what Doc and other say above:

www.rockislandauction.com

Smith & Wesson - Registered Magnum 357

Extensively Documented, Historic Early Registration No. 2 Smith & Wesson .357 Registered Magnum Double Action Revolver Shipped to Ballistics Expert Phil Sharpe with Case, Factory Letter and Registration CertificateThis historic Registered Magnum, Reg. #2, is the earliest Registered Magnum ever...
www.rockislandauction.com www.rockislandauction.com

The gun in the picture is Registration #2 that went to Phil Sharpe. I don't think I've seen a picture of Hoover's gun, though I may have and have just forgotten it.

Riposte
 
Roy Jinks wrote an article titled "The Revolver that Changed the Direction of Handgunning."
Roy said the pair were built for the American Potash & Chemical Corp., Trona, California. Shipped November 21, 1936. Serial number 49710, registration number 1590 in .357 Magnum and 49736, registration number 1591 in .22 LR. Both 8 3/8", blue finish. Front sights were King ramp reflectors with red post. King 112 rear sight. Magna stocks. The Magnum was $60 and the .22 LR was $150. The .22 is listed in the Pre-War .357 Magnum Database.
Dr. Jinks article was published in the Winter 1989 S&WCA Journal. It is available online to SWCA members.
 
Doc44 said:
The Model 29 used by Clint Eastwood in "Magnum Force" is in the NRA museum. Jim Supica, Former Director of the Museum, brought the gun to Tulsa a number for years ago for Show & Tell at the Southwest Bunch meeting there during the Tulsa Arms Gun Show. I had a photo of me holding the 44, but the photo was lost when the photo hosting site I was using suffered a catastrophic fire many years ago.

Collectors have posted want ads in local papers offering a reward for information about the .22 "Magnum", but nothing was ever learned about it.

Bill
Click to expand...
Thanks so much.
I will be booking myself a gig in Tulsa asap!
I have to see this one.
 
Model29-26.5 said:
....and the actual Dirty Harry 29 used in the opening credits of "Magnum Force" would be my two grail guns....
Click to expand...
The guns used in all of those movies were probably owned and provided by Stembridge gun rentals in CA....At one time, their arsenal was as big as a small country. I think the US Government borrowed some firearms from them once.

They are now owned by ISS or "Independent Studio Services". They seem to keep good records and I would imagine they know where that particular gun, (or multiples of it used in filming), is located.
 
Doc44 said:
… One was in .357 Magnum caliber and the other in .22 Long Rifle caliber. The latter cost $150 (approximately three times the cost of a Registered Magnum) if I remember correctly. Collectors have searched for this pair for many years, but it has never been located. This is the only Registered Magnum chambered in .22 LR.
Click to expand...
I am sure whoever inherited them does not realize what they have. They could also be in the attic of a ranch house and long forgotten.
 
i ought to check out every LGS around the area every time I'm out that way.
You never know what you might find or who doesn't know what they have.
As a guy who has only been in the game for about 18 months and knows very little, I am amazed at some of the Gunbroker listings of old Smith's by sellers who give so little info and mis label and miss things they ought to know about if they're running a business.
That 22 registered mag might just show up in a store and get missed because the owner doesn't recognize the model.
Stranger things have happened.
Here's hoping…
 
Model29-26.5 said:
i ought to check out every LGS around the area every time I'm out that way.
You never know what you might find or who doesn't know what they have.
As a guy who has only been in the game for about 18 months and knows very little, I am amazed at some of the Gunbroker listings of old Smith's by sellers who give so little info and mis label and miss things they ought to know about if they're running a business.
That 22 registered mag might just show up in a store and get missed because the owner doesn't recognize the model.
Stranger things have happened.
Here's hoping…
Click to expand...
Truth....I routinely see S&W revolvers in Tampa pawn shop cases listed as "S&W .38 special model unknown" that are actually Victory Models. Because the model number isn't stamped, they don't go any further to identify it.
 
MelvinWalker said:
The guns used in all of those movies were probably owned and provided by Stembridge gun rentals in CA....At one time, their arsenal was as big as a small country. I think the US Government borrowed some firearms from them once.

They are now owned by ISS or "Independent Studio Services". They seem to keep good records and I would imagine they know where that particular gun, (or multiples of it used in filming), is located.
Click to expand...

No doubt they were but IIRC one of the guns used in MF ended up being presented to John Millius - it could have been the one in the NRA Museum but that is too long ago to remember.

John Milius bought acreage around Gunsite long ago and he was acquainted with the Coopers but in all my trips I never ran into him - I think he actually lived somewhere else. John suffered a stroke but the last I heard he has recovered enough to shoot a little.

John is an interesting guy but I don't wan't to wander off down that bunny trail in a thread on J Edgar Hoover's .357 :)

Riposte
 
Flygas said:
John Milius, the writer of Dirty Harry, told me he owned the .44 Magnum used in the movie. Or at least that was the case quite a few years ago, and I don't think he's sold it.
Click to expand...
That thing would be worth a ton.
I'd love to own one from any of the movies, but I'm guessing collectors would outbid me by many times over.
I hear there were several used in the movie.
Not sure which one I would want from the first movie, but the one in the opening credits of Magnum force was Smith & Wesson doubling down on product placement from the get-go.
They knew what happened to sales after the first movie so it was a great move to convince anyone who was on the fence by putting it right there in the second movie.
 
I don't have serial numbers, etc., but I read years ago that two Model 29-2s were made for the move, "Dirty Harry", in S&W's tool room as the Model 29 was not in production at the time and a Model 29 could not be located for purchase. The two 29-2s were shipped to Kelly Lookabaugh, S&W Sales Representative for the Los Angeles area, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Bill
 
Doc44 said:
I don't have serial numbers, etc., but I read years ago that two Model 29-2s were made for the move, "Dirty Harry", in S&W's tool room as the Model 29 was not in production at the time and a Model 29 could not be located for purchase. The two 29-2s were shipped to Kelly Lookabaugh, S&W Sales Representative for the Los Angeles area, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Bill
Click to expand...
I was hooked on the model 29 because of that movie.
I didn't "pull the trugger" on getting one until Jan last year at the age of 52, even though I had appreciated it since I was a kid and had replicas and models.
It was always something that I had kind of buried but had a fascination with.
Once I got that one I figured I'd get a 19 as, back then, I kind of saw it as the little brother.. and a 22 for cheap shooting. this was before I knew about the 27… and I was immediately sucked in the whole thing, so I have been kind of making up for lost time!
 
Doc44 said:
I don't have serial numbers, etc., but I read years ago that two Model 29-2s were made for the move, "Dirty Harry", in S&W's tool room as the Model 29 was not in production at the time and a Model 29 could not be located for purchase. The two 29-2s were shipped to Kelly Lookabaugh, S&W Sales Representative for the Los Angeles area, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Bill
Click to expand...
Without looking, I remember reading that the studio had a hard time sourcing the .44 magnum guns at the time, so they went with what available, which was a .41 magnum...This was the first movie not Magnum Force.
 
To answer the OP, If I found the 22 RM I would shoot it to see how it has faired.

In all practicality, the gun has been passed on along with millions of mining stock to inheritors. They may know what they have but they continue to value privacy far more than they might need a measly $100,000 for Grandpas old gun.
 
mtgianni said:
To answer the OP, If I found the 22 RM I would shoot it to see how it has faired.

In all practicality, the gun has been passed on along with millions of mining stock to inheritors. They may know what they have but they continue to value privacy far more than they might need a measly $100,000 for Grandpas old gun.
Click to expand...
Yes. It belongs in a museum, but a super cool thing to be privately owned.
 
Flygas said:
John Milius, the writer of Dirty Harry, told me he owned the .44 Magnum used in the movie. Or at least that was the case quite a few years ago, and I don't think he's sold it.
Click to expand...

I think he demanded they buy him one in his contract, but not sure it's the on-screen gun as those can get abused a good bit.
 
There is more BS and gossip about what guns Dirty Harry pretended to use in the pretend Dirty Harry movies, and about J Edgar Hoover's revolvers, than can be imagined! Personally, I could care less who owned any guns that I might want to buy. It doesn't add once cent to their value as far as I'm concerned.

Same for folks wetting their panties about Elvis or Elmer Keith guns.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

T
Top 10 Registered Magnums
2
Replies
41
Views
4K
richcory
richcory
M
J Frame 32 H&R Magnum for Deep Concealment
2
Replies
39
Views
2K
Sgt. Buzzard
S
RM Vivas
Magnum Musings - A Spicy Magnum
Replies
4
Views
559
MSD2343
M
cmansguns
need some help - vintage K 38 nomenclature and date UPDATE July 16 see last post!!!
Replies
18
Views
1K
desi2358
D
RM Vivas
Archival Observations: Super Engraved Registered Magnum; .357 Magnum Revolving Rifle
Replies
3
Views
374
RM Vivas
RM Vivas

Latest posts

Back
Top