Vintage firearm ads

Wears his service revolver holster backwards too......

Looks like he forgot his bayonet, doesn't it?

That's an interesting grip technique the officer is using there.
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That's back when advertising agencies could get away with not knowing the product, not knowing their market, just knowing someone high up in Colt Mfg.
 
In the case of the revolver being backwards that isn't necessarily wrong. Forty years ago many cops carried their revolvers in crossdraw holsters. My father started in law enforcement in 1970 and he was offered either a crossdraw holster or a strongside holster. He went with the strong-side since the thinking was changing by then and it had been realized that cross-draw wasn't a secure way to carry a duty revolver. Too easy for the bad guys to grab it. Anyway just some trivia.
 
I think the "unusual" grip may be an artifact that resulted from taking a non-copyrighted stock photograph of a cop holding something else, trimming out that object, and then drawing a rifle in its place.

Computerized photo or graphic editing software did not exist in the late 60s and early 70s. If you needed an image for an advertisement, you had to create it the old-fashioned way- hire a model and a photographer, or hire a graphic artist to draw it with pen and ink. However, if you had no budget and/or time, the fallback was stock photos.

Picture a Don Draper type character sticking his head into the art department office: "Guys, we need this ad for Colt, and I want to keep them happy so we can get the rest of their business, but we have no budget and I need it wrapped up by tomorrow. Eddie, what can you give me within the next 4 hours?" :rolleyes:
 
Wears his service revolver holster backwards too......
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Back in the '70s and '80s, a few agencies did issue cross-draw holsters. Some like Oakland had clamshells that popped open when you pressed the button. Problems happened if a little kid pushed the button on the cop's holster. Down drops the revolver. Opps. :o
 
One of my favorites.

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I believe that that rifle grip was actually taught at one time as a means of controlling the muzzle flip during hip shooting.

I've tried it.

Can't hit crap.
 
I believe that that rifle grip was actually taught at one time as a means of controlling the muzzle flip during hip shooting.
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But... for heaven's sake why would one even attempt to hip-shoot a rifle in the first place? :eek:

Wait... 1960s and earlier... never mind. :rolleyes:
 
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