Please excuse me my tardiness, Alexa ate my homework… OK, now I’m lying on top of being late – as if I’d trust a robot to do my data mining. I was actually enjoying some sun in LA over the weekend with Turbo, to celebrate a few anniversaries – one of which I mentioned last week – and catching up with Kaoru Rogers, fellow jeweller and (serial) immigrant.
But now it’s back down the data mine.
Aaron Patrick Presley (the 37 year old is also reported as being called Patrick Presley,) was killed just before 5am in a tavern in Milwaukee. Tiron J. Grant (31) allegedly shot Presley after Presley confronted him when he said hello and grabbed the hand of a woman in the bar, who turned out to be Presley’s fiancée. I could find no further details about progress in the case against Grant beyond charges and the preliminary hearing date – January 13th 2017. The only mention of the weapon was that a revolver, and the suspect’s clothes, were hidden by the suspect in alleyway garbage bins near the tavern.
I’ve drawn one revolver so far, the Ruger Single Six .22 from incident #15, as a .22 caliber was specified in the reporting that I unearthed. I had a hunch that there was a more common revolver, so after a quick dig, I give you the Smith & Wesson Model 10. Why this weapon? Well, on Wikipedia’s list of most produced firearms it sits at the top of revolvers with 6 million units sold. This makes it the biggest selling revolver ever (at least on that list), though given that it’s been in continuous production since 1899, the Model 10 has had over 100 years to climb to that spot – which on that chart makes for a slow build rather than a meteoric rise (but then confirming sales data for 100 years is somewhat of a tall order). By comparison, the already featured Glock 17 is listed just below the Model 10 with a low estimate of production of 6 million and a high of 10 million. It has only been in production since 1982, so that in itself is an indication of the rapid increase in the global gun population.
It’s also interesting to note that it is “previously known as the Smith & Wesson .38 Hand Ejector Model of 1899, the Smith & Wesson Military & Police or the Smith & Wesson Victory Model.” Thanks Wikipedia.
I’ve already drawn a weapon that is known as the Smith & Wesson Military & Police, which you might recall is a pistol. It’s nice to know that Smith & Wesson like to keep their branding current while getting to add a certain old-school, or perhaps I should say, time honoured, vibe, thanks to some cleverly manufactured “continuity.”