Ten historic shoot outs on Discovery tonight.

G

g.willikers

New member
The Discovery channel is airing what sounds like a very interesting show tonight, at 10pm.
The ten most historically important shootouts, the stories and the guns used.
 
Looks like it's a couple guys from Sons of Guns and American Guns talking about it. Here's the description from the Discovery Channel page:

SONS OF GUNS' Will Hayden and AMERICAN GUNS' Rich Wyatt countdown ten iconic American shootouts--from Wild West standoff to mob hit to world war. Firing the historic weapons, they give rare insight into the guns--and the gun owners--that changed history.
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Might be interesting. At least it shouldn't be worse than most other stuff on.
 
"Looks like it's a couple guys from Sons of Guns and American Guns talking about it."

And that right there is more than reason enough for me to erase it from the record schedule on my DVR.
 
"Looks like it's a couple guys from Sons of Guns and American Guns talking about it."

And that right there is more than reason enough for me to erase it from the record schedule on my DVR.
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HaHaHa, that pretty much sums it up for me also.
 
Overall the show was ok, but to me nothing real special with one notable exception.

They profiled a gun used by “Baby Face” Nelson of the John Dillinger gang a Colt 1911 .38 Super converted to full auto with a fore grip and I believe a 20 round magazine. While many of you may be familiar with this gun I had never seen it before and thought it was a neat historic handgun.


Here's a link to a picture of the gun.

http://www.imfdb.org/wiki/File:1911Full.jpg
 
I wonder what criteria they used to pick the "shootouts" they showed. The full auto 1911 was very interesting; Clyde Barrow's sawed off BAR was too. The 10 gauge SXS that Doc Holiday used at the O.K. corral was probably fueled with black powder cartridges. I wonder if that's what they used for the demo.

"Looks like it's a couple guys from Sons of Guns and American Guns talking about it."

And that right there is more than reason enough for me to erase it from the record schedule on my DVR.
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Yup, I agree as well. I watched it, though, and wished I could have handled the Thompson. I was in the local Gander Mountain store yesterday; they have a new "Tommy gun" in their showcase. It's semi-auto of course, but otherwise it's the real deal. They let me handle it after I asked- it's heavy but felt great in my hands. That's the first time I've had an opportunity to actually hold one and I got so enthusiastic about it I almost bought it- until I thought about it a bit: .45 ACP ammo is expensive, the gun is pretty much useless for anything, and it costs $1499.99 before sales tax. That would buy me the Kimber .45 I want, or so many other nice guns, so I gave it back to the clerk.
 
Top Ten Shootouts

I watched a program last night with the hosts/stars of Sons of Guns and American Guns. They more or less listed some more famous shoot outs and demonstrated.the main weapons involved. Kind of a neat show, not from a tactical or teaining standpoint at all, just entertainment. It did raise a couple questions though, for me at least. While in the Marine Corps and when working as an armed security officer I watched countless documentery and training films, situation recreations, shot drills based on situations taken from detailed reports. Good training.

What would you consider to be infulential or game changing incidents? For me, the North Hollywood shootout/robbery was a major one. It validated a small but growing number number of people saying the carbine should or coukd replace the pump shotgun as a primary law enforcement longarm. How many ar15s are in cop cars now?

Id love to hear your input on what situations and what lessons were learned
 
"The 10 gauge SXS that Doc Holiday used at the O.K. corral was probably fueled with black powder cartridges."

The gunfight happened in 1881.

There were some very early smokeless powders (nitrated wood pulp, and other things) that were being used in shotshells, such as Schultz's White Powder, but I suspect that their penetration into the marketplace at this time, especially in the west, was VERY low.
 
Definitely the North Hollywood and the 1986 Miami FBI shootout were the most influential in changing LE mindsets. That would be 1 and 2 in my book.

A lot of other gunfights had huge historical/political impacts as well as equipment R&D:

IMO, in no particular order:

3. The OK Corral gunfight
4. Little Big Horn
5. countless gunfights in Iraq and Afghanistan
6. the "Black Hawk Down" incident
7. countless gunfights in WW1, WW2, Korea and Vietnam leading to new weapons development
8. the attempted assassination of Harry Truman
9. the 1974 SLA shootout
10. multiple shootouts in the NYPD Stakeout Squad (Jim Cirillo)
 
I think the one incident regarding the changing of LE training that is too often left out of these conversations is the "Onion Field".

The incident was brought to light with Wambaugh's book of the same name.

I know we changed our training after studying the incident.

It certainly is more common and pertinent to the street cop then the North Hollywood and the 1986 Miami FBI shootout.
 
Just curious... I do find the Sons of Guns guy to be way over the top... but what is the beef with them? It appears as if everybody here absolutely hates them.
 
That's what I thought. I certainly don't mean to say that a 10 Gauge shotgun, both barrels, would be insignificant using early propellants. But just how much more power do you think there would be in a 10 gauge shell these days, using Blue Dot, say, than in the days of black powder?
 
Not always but sometimes we get good discussions and interesting topics on here, you guys seem to be adding another to that list. Thank you for your responses. The SLA shootout (forgive me if Im wrong here) was the first deployment or at least serious deployment of the new and crazy lapd swat team right? If that isnt considered historical and gamechangeing what would?

I have read the onion field but its been a long time, and ears a little research, thank you.

And now Im embarresed, I live in KC, my gf lives and is from Independence, and Ive.never heard of an attempt on Pres. Truman. I will be reserching that today. I eat at Arthur Bryants in the cirty pretty often, its the BBQ place Truman used to play poker at. Every Presedent after him (except Obama unless Im mistaken) has eaten there. Funny to think about the leaders of the free world, eating in a dirty little hole in the wall bbq joint. If your ever in kc, try it. Fantastic burnt ends lol.

Back on topic, another one that I can remember makeing an impact on me and my thought process and training was the Richard Blackhurn video. After seeing that video it made contact distance shooting a regular part of my training as well as maintaining control of peoples hands when working. I still hate seeing peoples hands in their pockets because of that risk.
 
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