Sunday show and tell.

When I was young I wanted a 3.5" M27. I finally bought one in the late 1970s. It was about 5 years old when I got it but was in new condition in an incorrect 4" wooden box. Of course, it was stolen in 1985 along with all my other guns (N392847 if you happen across it) so I bagged another one at my favorite emporium. I swapped the standard trigger for the wide, smooth one as I like this trigger and have this style on many of my N frames.

Around 1999 I dropped into this tiny gun shop in a tiny town in Utah where I lived for a few years and he had about three dozen 4" M19s he'd bought from the county sheriff's department. They has gone to autos years earlier and finally unloaded all the wheelguns. I noticed one N frame sticking up in the row of 19s and it proved to be a 3.5" N frame. He had it priced at the same $275 he was asking for the 19s. I know, I should have bought a couple of those, too, but what I wanted was the N frame. It wore its original stocks numbered to the gun, but they were pretty rough so I put on a proper set in better shape.

About four years ago I wandered into a local gun show toting a 1967 Colt alloy Commander in 38 Super I no longer wanted. A dealer at a table wanted the Colt badly and offered me a 1950 3.5" 357 in nickel that had a set of stags and the original Magnas plus $200 cash for the Super. I'm still not sure who got the better end of the deal monetarily but I wanted the Smith more than the Colt so I made the deal. I later sold the stags for $150 so essentially I got the Smith and $350 for the Colt. Maybe it was worth more than that, I don't know.

So now I have three of these. At the prices these now bring, that's enough for me.