Real working copy of John Wayne’s six gun

It’s a stretch for this forum, but I have a thing for western guns as I do Cowboy Action Shooting as one of my hobbies. I’ve been a big fan of John Wayne’s screen-used firearms and recently found a company is making a good copy of the six gun he used in many of his films:
http://www.cimarron-firearms.com/Mod...terShooter.htm
Note: This is a REAL firearm and all laws apply. It’s offered in a few calibers, but .45 Long Colt is the correct one for John Wayne. I have been lucky enough to have seen and handled one of the six guns used by “The Duke” and documented being used in “Chisum” as well as a few other films, and now in the Al Frisch collection. I saw this pistol in 2005 when at the set of the History Channel series, “Mail Call.” Wayne used an original Colt Single Action Army with a 4.75 inch barrel and chambered for .45LC. The grips were a fake synthetic material to simulate heavily warn and aged ivory, and they had finger groves on the left side. It was held in the Stembridge gun rental company collection until they decided to sell off all their western guns (many of which went to Al). It’s doubtful this pistol has fired live ammunition ever, or least not for several decades if then. There is another documented John Wayne pistol, pretty much exactly like this one, also in private hands.
Here are some photos of the original pistol and me holding it:



And here is a matched set of Ruger New Model Vaqueros I customized to emulate (but not exactly replicate because the “finger groove” grips aren’t legal for cowboy action shooting) the original pistol. Note I went with 5.5 inch barrels as a personal preference:

Nice guns! I've been thinking of getting Cimarron's Wyatt Earp Buntline.

mbmcfarland said:

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Nice guns! I've been thinking of getting Cimarron's Wyatt Earp Buntline.

I have one of their US Volunteer models as I do living History as one of Teddy Roosevelt's "Rough Rider" cavalry officers (a troop leader, Captain), and they carried arsenal rebuild Colt SAAs that had 5.5 inch barrels. The Cimarron version even comes with US markings, mismatched finishing, and even the inspector stamps on the grips!

Nice stuff! I have a 6" SAA model that my Dad gave me but I really wish it was the 4.75" It too is chambered in 45LC.

BTW - How is this a stretch for this forum? We have plenty of gun nuts here. The fact that yours is an actual firearm only makes it the ULTIMATE collectible weapon prop!

Very cool. I'm a big John Wayne fan, and an even bigger fan of single action shooting. Thanks for sharing the photos!

Nice read... And welcome.

I've recently been on a movie Western firearm kick, albeit I'm working with fairly cheap Denix replicas. Doing the guns from Silverado. I have one Denix "nickel" plated SAA Colt with replaced faux pearl grips (Jake's), a Denix SAA Colt with their basic (poor) black paint that I painted the grips with an ivory color to simulate Paden's, plus I'm currently working on repainting a Denix Henry rifle.

I'm beginning to regret investing a few hundred dollars in Denix replicas, as I believe one can get blank firing pistols for not much more than a Denix.

Anyway, back to your topic...

Neat story/write-up, and cool pistol. Not sure I'm a fan of the orange grips, but the explanation makes sense. Didn't know that ivory grips go orange over time.

Where were your pics taken? Looks like an old west set - perhaps Universal Studios?

I appreciate the warm reception this got here, I was concerned that people wanted to focus on sci-fi stuff and would sneer at the topic.

PHArchivist said:

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Where were your pics taken? Looks like an old west set - perhaps Universal Studios?

No, they were taken at Sable Ranch in Santa Clarita. The ranch has several sets there. This is a very decrepit Western set, was used a lot on the “Wild West Tech” show on History Channel. It’s also the “abandoned Movie set” they used in, “V – the Final battle”. It’s less than 500 yards away from the open field they used for the house in “The Haunted Mansion,” and the castle in “Robin Hood – Men in Tights.” Several scenes from “Star Trek – Enterprise” and other shows have been filmed on the ranch as well. The main tent set from “Mail Call” was further away from here, which is why I was there. They flew me down to do a segment as a “talking head” on WW2 cartoonist Bill Mauldin. If you ever watched that show much, you may have seen me and almost certainly saw some of the stuff I sold to the production company for set stuff. My segment was filmed earlier that day, and I was invited to hang around until my plane left that evening. They filmed a neat segment on western guns there and shot up some watermelons.
Here’s me and “Gunny” Lee Ermey, note he’s still wearing his six gun for the segment:

Me at the tent set later that day:

While the six gun segment was being set up, we stumbled across this B-24 mockup, used in the low-budget cornball, “Beautiful Dreamer”:

The guy in the photo (and also standing to my right in the photo of me holding the gun) is Hugh Daly, who’s done a lot of bit part and some “B movie” leading roles in Hollywood: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2457575/ Really nice guy, and we’ve kept in touch. He was working on the show at the time.

Very cool...!

Great gun prop, nothing beats a real bullet firing hero. I'm a big fan of props based off of real firearms still being able to fire!

Great story. Thank you for sharing it.

Man, I miss Mail Call. Lock N' Load was a great show though too.

Also a fan of Ruger Vaqueros, I forgot to mention. Damn fine guns.

Welcome to the RPF too.

Man drooling all over my keyboard..,,Thanks for posting that.

I've got a Vaquero just like those, except with "normal" (non-aged) ivory grips. Fired it for the first time last weekend, I love it.

What kind of revolver was Ermey using?

Jedi2016 said:

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What kind of revolver was Ermey using?

I don’t know, I remember they had several pistols from Al’s collection and a few modern cowboy action shooting pistols. Probably it would have been made by Uberti or one of the other modern replica makers. I wasn’t as nearly well versed on western guns at the time as I am now. You might be able to look up the segment on youtube. I have the DVD of the segment that they filmed (I was at the set all afternoon watching them film it), maybe I’ll upload it there if it’s not there already.

hey, I was in Cimarron, New Mexico a couple weeks ago! is that where the company is based?

kiddo said:

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hey, I was in Cimarron, New Mexico a couple weeks ago! is that where the company is based?

No, they’re out of Texas.

I need to check Cimarron again my Step Dad is also a huge JW fan and would love to have one of those.

And the fact that the vaquero uses transfer bar safety tech vs. the firing pin actually being on the hammer. I can't imagine a 45LC 4.5 barrel. My 44mag 5.5 vaquero is a handful to say the least. The 500 shoots easier.

Nice guns...
Lucky cow,it's so hard to own this kind of guns here in France,only cap and ball are easy to obtain...
You can keep standart grips for CAS,and make custom grips when you don't use them.
You can get lucky enough to use true ox bone grips,and give them good orange color!
you can use "permanganate de potassium"
Are you a fast drawer?

Cool, thanks for sharing!

Cool thread!! I love the Ruger single actions, they are fine guns. I've had several of them myself over the years.

Chris

Diggin up an old thread as a friend mentioned it to me.

Al is a good friend and ive been doing some side projects for him. One of those is replicating the finger groove grips off that John Wayne six shooter. I have those grips sitting on my table as we speak and did an as is mold off them. I plan to remaster a pair of castings for an as new finish. In the meantime ive been playing around with various materials after getting burned out trying to replicate the original look of the material.

The originals are semi translucent with a cloudy internal to them. You would only realize this by having the grips off the gun and holding them up to a light. I know how they did this but the material is no longer available. The issue is the proper color and translucency. The surface color has been aged over time (amber orange) where the back is a much lighter yellow color.

Look at the cast wood set on the left I did from that mold. This was just a side project as a gift for Al. Once I get the proper color and translucency down ill see if anyone is interested in them.

Sorry, but as an ex shooter of single action years ago, I can't see how it's possible to shoot one's self in the foot by fast drawing a live SA pistol. It would normally be carried uncocked and cannot be fired without cocking, so how would you shoot yourself in the foot with it coming out of the holster?

I know this happens with DA revolvers but not easy to do with SA.

I always had a soft spot for the western rigs. I used to have an original gunslinger holster (ie one from the 1800's) which was near perfect, had been stored and the leather protected so it was still serviceable and several experts had verified the age of the fittings and the style of the rig as a genuine one. Was made for a 4.5 long barrel and my SA vaquero was longer so didn't fit. Unfortunately it was stored with the gun in a gun club vault and was stolen.

If I had to pick a favourite then the Buntline would be it. Unless we are talking cap and ball in which case the Walker Colt wins hands down.

p51 said:

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No, I have known two people into that who have shot themselves in the legs while doing so with live ammunition (competition fast draw is usually done with blanks or low-power rounds and the holsters often have heavy curved steel plates at the bottom to deflect any rounds fired while still inside). I only do competition shooting, but not very often due to my other interests and work often getting in the way. Click below if you're more interested:
Thunderbolt Productions - WW2 art, photography and paperwork
And here's a shot of my US Volunteer pistol if anyone wants to see it. I've hsot it twice but mostly use when I'm wearing my Spanish-American War 1st Volunteer Cavalry captain's uniform for living history timeline events:

he said "leg" not "foot". I suppose if your already cocked when pulling its easy set off. Ive seen many experienced gun people accidentally mishandle guns of many era's while working on projects. If they had been loaded, not only legs would have been hit but baby makers as well.