An Octogenarian Geezer Looks at Silencers

摘要

Sitting here in relative isolation watching the snow fall, my mind drifts to pondering over two of many gifts from China, the most recent being the novel corona-virus with its social distancing. The other, a number of centuries ago, was gunpowder which permitted engaging targets at relatively great distances with the disadvantage of significantly more noise than that of the bow and arrow. A little over 100 years ago, Hiram Percy Maxim applied some of his automotive muffler concepts to firearms, thereby starting the modern firearm silencer (or, more correctly, suppressor) industry. Initially popular for backyard shooting, silencer technology and interest languished with passage of the original National Firearms Act of 1934. The imposed tax of $200 (over 7 ounces of gold) for a $7 silencer was prohibitive during the Great Depression of the 1930s. World War Ⅱ saw military development of silencers primarily for clandestine operations by the British SAS and our OSS. Weapons included the De Lisle carbine, STEN MK IIS, Welrod, OSS High Standard HDM-S Military and a number of other similar designs built experimentally for various platforms. Our involvement in Vietnam spurred development of newer, silenced weapons by small companies (such as Military Armament Corporation and Knight's Armament) for the military market. In the same time frame, a young entrepreneur with a class 2 Federal Firearms License, Jonathan Arthur Ciener, started modifying mostly Ruger .22LR weapons into silenced versions and advertising widely with small, one-inch-column ads in periodicals aimed at the sportsman, collector and shooter. These ads mostly sold his catalogs, but they did spark interest in the general public.