Greetings, all! My first post here ... I am attempting to gather detailed background information on the Ruger Mk-1 .22 pistols purchased by the US Army during the period ~1955 - 1967, as well as the Mk-2's purchased in the mid-1980's by the Army.
Ideally, I'd love to be able to establish a contact with someone who had hands-on service experience with these pistols or the program, like a former armorer or marksmanship team member.
Thanks for any leads!
There's a book that has details of all the the info you're looking for, but what it's called escapes me at the moment. Might be something as simple as the "History of Ruger .22 Pistols" but I'm sure that's not it. I've read bits of it, but don't own a copy.
The Mk IIs, I seem to recall, had a small over run, and were sold on the civilian market- 5? 50?, not many.....
Thanks for the reply. I have the book you mention, and several others. They only contain what i would call a high-level overview, and some numbers on how many pistols were in each contract run, dates, etc. I'm looking for first hand accounts on how the guns were actually used in-service, arsenal mods, etc. I've come accross some anecdotal info on the web, but not the specifics I'm after. Thanks again!Quote:
Originally Posted by jmoore
Jmoore,
Do you think this might be the book you are thinking about?
Amazon.com: The Ruger .22 Automatic Pistol: Standard/ Mark I/ Mark Ii Series (9780873644884): Duncan Long: Books
I had never seen this book before and only did a search on Amazon for Ruger .22 -
There is a preview area that looked like it was pretty detailed on the history, but it only presented a few pages of the history before it ended.
I bought a Mark I many years ago when I was about 10 years old and I may buy this book just for the interest - It was the first firearm I ever bought and I gave my dad about $10 a week from mowing yards and he kept the funds until I had enough. He surprised me one day when he brought the new pistol home. I had only given him about half the money and he told me that he diced to match the funds if I let him shoot it once in a while! (Good memories)
That's probably it. I saw it when one of the contract over run pistols was purchased by a friend- it turned out the one he had was the one pictured in the book! Somebody else REALLY had to have it...
Sorry, that I wasn't of more help. I can't think of anyone that i know in the AMU or AMTU from that time period, what few folk I know were either before or after that time frame. (And most of them were "just" trigger pullers, NOT historians or techies.)
Back in the 1970,s we had them at the Armoury for target shooting in the basement range and they were U.S. marked.