Book Review by J.B. Wood | Contributing Editor
101 CLASSIC FIREARMS, by John Marshall. © 2014. Published by Dillon Precision Products, 8009 E. Dillon’s Way, Dept. TGM, Scottsdale, AZ 85260; phone: 800-223-1570; online: dillonprecision.com. Hardbound, 9 X ll.5 inches, 224 pages, more than a hundred photos. Price: $39.95, including shipping.
For a long time, I have been saving the center pages of Dillon’s excellent little magazine/catalogue, the Blue Press. That space is filled with John Marshall’s “Classic Firearms,” a different one in each edition. “Filled” is a good descriptive word, as I often found facts about the gun, or its designer, that even I didn’t know.
Recently, the people at Dillon had a really good idea. They gathered a hundred-and-one of these, and made a book. It is, though, a lot more than just reprints of those center pages. In addition to the guns, there are “Biographical Sidebars” of notable designers, such as John D. Pedersen, John T. Thompson, and William B. Ruger, among others.
Once again, in those designer-profiles, I found an occasional fact that was new to me. In addition to the designer-sketches, there is also one on a famous “user” of firearms: Sergeant Alvin C. York. From all of this, the guns and the people, it is obvious that Marshall is a master of meticulous research.
The layout of the book is chronological. It starts with the US Model 1855 Rifle Musket, and ends with the Heckler & Koch Mark 23 SOCOM pistol. Along the way, every type of firearm you can imagine is covered. To qualify, a gun had to be a “classic” — for example, the Ruger Standard .22 pistol, and the Russian AK-47. To borrow a rating system from the movie review people, I’ll give this book four stars.
