Rare Guns: Difference between revisions

While the "Tommy Gun" or "Chicago Typewriter" is a firearm recognizable by anyone who knows what side the bullets come out of and an iconic part prohibition era crime, the Thompson Submachine Gun was actually a massive failure: Its high cost (half a new car) and weight (over 10 pounds) ensured that by 1929, over 10 years after its invention in 1918, it had sold just 10,300 units and Auto-Ordnance was over 2 million in debt (in 1928 dollars). The few gangsters that owned Tommy Guns had stolen theirs from police and, then as today, the most popular firearms among criminals were small and concealable pistols. Despite this failure it looked and sounded quite impressive on the silver screen and a movie company could easily afford to buy one that [[Prop Recycling|could be reused in dozens of movies]]. The Thompson would lose its rare gun status in [[World War II]] and reach production of 2 million (plus an unknown number of Chinese copies), but this salvation would be short lived as many cheaper and lighter alternatives were developed during the war and the 1934 National Firearms Act effectively banned it from civilians ownership.