When was it that law enforcement agencies nationwide began switching over from revolvers to semi-automatic pistols? Late 80's, early 90's?
Why did it take so long? Semi's such as the 1911 were around way before then. Was it a reliability issue with earlier semi's?

Some small departments allowed 1911s prior to the 1970s, but when a large department adopted the S&W Model 39-2 (9mm) in the 1970s, it really took off. Many departments followed suit with that model. Beretta's 92 also became a popular adoption in the late 1970s, but many departments held on to their revolvers till the 1980s. NYPD didn't switch till 1993. Glock was just getting very popular at that time, and soon dominated police adoptions.

Most semi autos were not designed to feed anything but FMJ (ball) ammunition, which had long been known to have a very poor track record for stopping people. Revolver ammo was not limited to FMJ and even using older designs such as the +P 38 Special 158-grain LSWC-HP ammunition produced much better results in the field.

That in addition to the fact that departments were dealing with institutionalized thinking. Change is incredibly slow. Most people that are in charge of policy change are older and have been in a position or on a department for a long time and suffer from the "Well if it was good enough for me" syndrome and confirmation bias. Look how long it took to get things like night sights or flashlights on handguns. Today there are still a great many agencies that will not allow police officers to have a flashlight on a handgun or a rifle.

I worked for an agency that had a dumbfugg of an uneducated twit in charge of the firearms program that was adamant about never having lights on rifles or handguns. It took me being involved in a shootout in a darkened building where the badguy had knocked out the lights and I was trying to balance a light in one hand and a rifle in the other to cause the department to change.

Consider the liability of trying to take a hostage rescue shot with an iron sighted rifle in the dark, holding it one handed, while balancing a flashlight, hoping you don't shoot the hostage. All because the guy in charge is stuck in the 1980s and has deliberately handicapped you.

Change is slow. Not due to technology, but due to incompetence of those in charge. That is why change is so slow in law enforcement.

Mackay,

I was wondering why something such as the 1911 didn't get adopt by law enforcement after WWII and stayed with their revolvers. I always thought it was because of 1911's reliability issues. Good feedback!

In my opinion one of the biggest catalyst for change was brought on by the Miami shooting in 1986. The FBI "research" that followed was latched on to by the gun writing world and this was largely due to the fact that the gun writing world was who the FBI sought out to help with their "research" and development of newer, better, duty weapons.

Savvy lawmen did use and love the 1911 and Browning Hi-Power for years but these were mostly relegated to real professionals that belonged to departments or agencies that allowed for such things.

The idea of giving a 1911 or Hi-Power to large departments would fall pretty fugking flat and for good reason. Firearms training for a lot of departments consisted of nothing. I know a guy that took a job as a "summer cop" in the early 80's. This was very common in a lot of towns and cities back in the day. His duty sergeant literally dug around a desk drawer and handed him a Model 10. Then he dug around the pen drawer in the middle of the desk until he found six rounds to give to the "summer help."

As Mackay mentioned, most people don't realize just how incompetent a lot of law enforcement were when it came to firearms and tactics. It was not uncommon in the 70s and 80s for a Chief to forbid the use of speedloaders because they didn't like the aesthetics of the pouches on a duty-belt. There were even places that an officer on probation could not have more than one reload on their belt because they had not yet "earned" a second reload. LOL

Another one of the biggest turning points in firearm culture and training in law enforcement has come from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. A lot of the professionals came back and found careers in teaching, and that teaching was rooted in hard reality. Add to that, that we have the internet and all these combat vets with real world experience can now find out what you really are or were and call you on your bullschit. It has gone a long way toward killing the old and absurd cultures that existed in law enforcement for decade upon decade.

It's actually a pretty fascinating topic when you really start to research it.

I believe NYPD was the last major police department to adopt a semi automatic. they didn’t trust their police officers they thought it would be the wild wild west :-) my brother at the time was street crime/gun squad. For the rest of his career he was not fond of the Glock. he did carry it occasionally still with a Snubby in his waist band. He opted to carry two revolvers, his model 10 and five or six shot Snubby. Back then the projectiles were not very reliable regarding to expansion.

Have you read Glock: The Rise of America's Gun?

It is a fascinating read and goes into great detail how Glock pulled this off.

Highly recommended for anybody interested in guns, or business:

https://www.amazon.com/Glock-Americas-Paul-M-Barrett/dp/0307719952

Lots of wisdom there.

I saw a few departments with a .357/38 policy for officers so that ammo could be standardized. That was a pretty weak argument in itself.

Some departments said you could carry anything 38spl up... One county I worked in, most departments in it, and most cops in those departments carried N Frames from .41 mag to 45Colt, but the majority in that county carried M29's or 629's.

A few of us carried a 1911 some in the 80's.

+1 on Mackay_Sagebrush’s comments. Some agencies could STILL be using revolvers. I have first hand experience of an agency just switching to semi autos 3 years ago. It’s an incredibly eye opening experience to train with or observe some who are trained and employed by certain agencies(who personally don’t own handguns or have a background of shooting or hunting)struggle with the weapon manipulation of a semi auto.

Doc_Holidude

Thanks I just ordered it

Back in the day, I had upper brass ask why we needed hollow point ammo, when 158gr LRN worked just fine for all these years...

Ignorance is the hardest thing to overcome. That and ignorance in training.

Everyone shot at the police range with 30spl. It was hammered into them to never let the brass hit the ground when reloading. Either put it in your pocket, or dump it in the brass can by your firing station.

Then a couple of cops were found dead with their empty brass in the pants pockets. Sometimes it takes a graphic example like that to sink the lessons in.

Those of us who carried rifles usually had to get special permission to do so.

You'll love it.

Most of the info comes from the attorneys and marketing teams Glock employed when the company came over.

And Gaston was a pimp. LOL

We have a young guy that we raised here on the ranch, and his mother, 2 sisters and 2 brothers still live and work here, when he Graduated from College, he joined the Texas Dept.Of Safety, AKA the Hi-Way Patrol, Now he is A Texas Ranger, he comes by to see his family and we visit about lots of subjects one is fire arms, today most Texas Rangers carry a 1911, it's more tradition than any thing, they also carry a trunk full of other fire arms, Several Rangers come and shoot on our Rifle and pistol ranges, They shoot more and better than 99% of other law enforcement that shoot here. Rio7

Me too.....

Cost to change over was a major hurdle.

Not the cost of the gun as much as the cost to re-train all the members.
When my old department switched over from Ruger Service Sixes to Glocks it was a 3 day training block for almost 2000 members, so the transition took a couple years.
There was also major resistance within some on the City Common Council and Mayor's office as to the idea of cops having "Semiautomatic" weapons. They control the purse strings.

A lot of police administrators didn't like the fact that a 1911 needed to be carried "clicked and locked" to the average citizen that looked scary.

Traditional police in shooting technique is 10 to 20 years behind the curve

I've had several people come up to me and ask if I knew my pistol was cocked...

Me too. And sometimes when you say "yeah, I know" then you get a safety lecture about how dangerous that is.

I don't let them get that far with the lecture.

When they mention it's cocked, I tell them that's 100% safe and how one is to be carried... Then turn my attention elsewhere.

Referring to how resistant some LE agencies are to change, I think until sometime in the 1980's all Missouri Highway Patrol troopers were issued and required to carry their sidearm in a right hand holster - even if the trooper was left handed. Uniformity of appearance was more important than the safety and effectiveness of the trooper.

Idiot top brass.

Common, but that example is pure stupidity.

MontanaMarine can relate.

LOL

Remember the scene in Serpico where he was picking up a department Browning Hi Power, and all the comments he got from other cops about it?

The way I heard the story was that, at the police ranges they were taught to pocket the brass (or put it in a bucket) rather than dump it because the department reloaded the brass so didn't want it damaged. Cops got killed because while reloading their revolvers they instinctively looked around for the bucket to put the brass in rather than just dumping it and reloading.

Jeff Cooper recounted in one of his books a story about a deputy in the crowd watching a parade. A kid pointed out to him that his pistol was cocked. He said he knew it was. The kid said, "Well, isn't that dangerous?" He bent over, put his face next to the kid's, and said, "You damn betcha."

Yup! Early in my career, carrying the 1911 I'd carefully explain why it was carried that way...

Later I'd just reply "Yes, I like it that way." That seemed to stop conversation but probably wasn't very good for public relations.

Guy

I think the main reason for the switch to semi autos was they needed to be able to defend themselves better if they ever got involved in a fire fight with the bad guys.The drug trafficking changed a lot of things for law enforcement officers in the late 1980's.Those guys were sometimes heavily armed with auto weapons and the officers were really out gunned carrying a S&W revolver.

one reason : 1986 fbi miami shootout

Yep
https://www.guns.com/news/2011/08/2...-that-changed-law-enforcement-nationwide

There's a sign on I80 just as you go east into New Jersey as a memorial to a NJ trooper killed there in a shootout. He was reloading his revolver when the bad guys shot him with their semi-autos. NJ later adopted a H&K 9mm.

Because semi-autos in general suck. The lack of training by the police force - that is they can't hit stuff caused the need for high-capacity magazines. If they could shoot straight there would have been no need for the [bleep] semi-autos.

Drink some prune juice and get another nap. Hopefully you come back in a better mood.

Incredible.

Never ever seen a down side to more ammo. Bill Allard was involved in more shootouts than anyone in NYPD history and it is sald that he never missed in a shout out and he ran in 1911 dry and his 12 guage with buckshot dry before stopping 2 felons.

More ammo is better than less

The saddest thing about dumb ass fugking comments like this is that the concept of "fire and maneuver" was developed between WWI and WWII and was the basis of an increased ammo capacity in combination of a higher rate of fire than could be achieved by a bolt action.

In other words, it's 1910ish type thinking.

The Glock 17 was fielded in 1982, or thereabouts. That is when the Tsunami of change began.

Around the same time, ammo was improving, and the Glock was reliable, fairly simple to learn, and easy to operate under stress.

Would love to have a NY state trooper .45 Colt New Service.

Know of one local force that required officers to buy their own
gun in the 80's. Pretty mhch anything was acceptable, except a 1911.

The policy was "a 45 was an excessive show of force".
Due to all the BS talk about how powerful it was, I guess.

Sherriff, his deputies and and the Town Clowns in our county
favored it.

They went with the H&k P7m13s

They didn’t want guys carrying a single action, is what I was told. Stress= accidental discharges…

Not everyone is a shootist.

A lot of police departments didn't even want officers carrying .357 Magnums.... "Magnum!!! That's so scary! It'll frighten the public! It'll look like we're out to kill people!" Even if you had a .357, you were often required to only use department issued .38spl. These types of administrators would have had their heads explode if they saw one of their officers with a 13-shot auto pistol!

My NRA handgun instructor in 1980 (who was a retired Deputy Sheriff) told me his son was an officer in the NYPD. He told me that what he did, and which was common practice on the force, was to carry his issue Model 10 S&W in his duty holster, but as a "backup gun" (which they were authorized to carry, and could carry whatever they wanted to) he carried a Beretta 92 IWB. He said that if he was ever called upon to draw a gun, it would be the Beretta, not the Model 10. That's how regular NYPD street cops got around the requirement to carry the Model 10 as their service weapon.

Price was probably a factor too.

In them days there wasn’t a lot of reasonably priced autos until Glock hit the market. 1911’s weren’t cheap, Browning’s weren’t either. Smith’s, i don’t remember much about them, although I had a 459 for a brief time.

Glocks were easier to transition to from a revolver, no safety to manipulate….point and click.

Unfortunately transitioning from a 12# DA pull weight to the original Glock trigger pull weight led to negligent discharges. Also using a holster that isn't compatible with a Glock can be a disaster. Glocks are a good pistol. Glock pricing and marketing led to the Glock being everywhere overnight.

When I lived in Albuquerque 64-74, police were nor permitted to carry .357 ammo.Knowing one very well he asked me to work up a load in a 38 sp case that was probably a +P or better. I did so and you could not tell the difference between them and a commercial round looking at them.It ended up about 1/2 dozen officer carried them.

This particular LEO was only one of a very few that qualified to carry a single action revolver as a duty weapon. If any one doubts me, I can give his .

The agencies issued revolvers……most officers could not afford a semi or did not have the knowledge to realize the benefits! JMO memtb

The case capacity of the .38 Special is enough to duplicate .357 Magnum. The only reason they lengthened the case for the .357 Magnum was to prevent anyone from using them in a .38 Special revolver.

The Illinois State Police was the first major law enforcement department to switch to semi-auto handgun. In 1967 they began issuing the S&W Model 39 and all troopers carried this until 1999 when they switched the the Glock 22.

Good gosh, why did it take so many other agencies so long to switch over? It couldn't have been a reliability issue, as the S&W 39's ran pretty good from what I've read.
Probably just too much beauracracy in the various departments.

In the early-mid 80's in S. Florida a police department had recently been issued new DA/SA S&W wonder nines, I don't recall the specific model.

Jump forward a couple of months to a briefing about juvenile crime with a room full of officers. One officer in the back, deciding to be a smart-ass, removed the magazine from his new semi-auto, jumped up and said, "I'll show you how to handle juvenile crime!", pointed the gun at the front of the room and pulled the trigger while yelling "bang! bang!", thereby firing the round left in the chamber into the wall a few feet to one side of the lecturer.

After the hubbub died down the lecturer was curious about where the bullet had ended up so he went around a hall to the spot he figured would be right behind the briefing room. It was a women's bathroom. He knocked and on receiving no answer opened the door and went in to find a woman slumped in a stall, dead, shot in the back of the head through the wall.

That's a true story. This has nothing to do with why it took so long for police officers to start carrying semi-autos.


I also have an anecdote from the Dania police department around the same time frame, early 1980's, about an officer who accidentally shot two police cars with his service revolver within the span of a week, from inside the car.

Yes, yes I can.

I'm a southpaw. This is a pic of my duty belt and revolver from 1984.

That State Department budget only so large, MM.

LOL

Yeah, they run on a shoestring budget.....more or less.....grin

glock saves lives.

"In a only four minutes a staggering amount of rounds were fired, over 125. Platt was struck 12 times and Matix six before they were finally put down. Both men had no alcohol or drugs in their system."

Love mine. Not a jam yet. Cool classic, too.

Damn.

I recall a national news story in the early 90s maybe late 80s where the LAPD was finally allowed to use hollowpoints instead of ball ammo in their revolvers. Now that was probably institutional and probably political.

My uncle was a deputy sheriff in L.A. county. He was one of many involved in putting down the Watts riot.

He carried a 38 Special S&W with target sights and 8” barrel.

He said that the court system made the police look like the bad guys if they carried a “magnum”.

He felt the ammo he used was close to 357 in power. Super-vel if I remember right.

This may have happened. But S&W SA/DA auto loaders from the 39 through the 3rd gen guns had a mag safety and will not fire with the mag removed.

Nope moving to high capacity [bleep] semi-autos is the same thinking that got so many Marines killed in Vietnam when they were forced to carry the high capacity worthless M-16’s.

Make up for lack of training and lack of being able to hit anything with more bullets. 50,000 bullets shot for every Vietcong killed.

My brothers who went in the Army instead of the Marines said their training with the M-16’s were a joke.

I don’t have to pull the trigger 20 times to hit something!
But for those that can’t hit squat “Spray and Pray”.

You can have your plastic pieces of junk. No thanks for me.

Just stop.

Yeah, I remember reading the articles about Super-Vel in the 1970s.

I remember reading that the mag safety allowed them to merely remove the magazine from the gun to transport prisoners into their cells, rather than handing their guns over to be checked in till they leave.

I also remember a case where a cop had the mag safety on his 39 removed, and someone who was handling it wanted to demonstrate to someone else that it could not fire without the mag, and to everyone's shock it went off when he pulled the trigger.

The other guys high cap mags worked well. So well we used em too.

Hue 1968

That's a Chinese AK. You can tell by the bayonet.

That's my point.

I wonder if that Marine in the picture knew the serious risk he was taking, smoking that cigarette?

L.W.

The c rats the smokes came from were 1946 vintage. Pre warning label.

Question then? Would you feel safer if today's cops toted K frame 357s or Bill Jordan and a Glock?

Poor cops were hamstrung by the establishment way back then, too, I see.
I thank those LEO's that do their job honorably, but I'll be damned if I would do their job given the way they are undercut at every corner.

The AK's were reliable. The M-16's should have been made by Daisy - they would have been much better - couldn't have been worse. But the Vietnamese didn't use the spray technique. They actually had rifles they could trust, and they aimed them. When shooting my M-16 at night with tracers, I could see the bullets tumbling - it begged the spray option. There was no faith in our rifles or the ability to hit anything.

I very well remember the 38 Super Vels of the ‘70’s. I had friends in law enforcement that had ricochets off of fairly steep angled windshields and one friend that shot at a fleeing felon (yes forbidden today) …..hitting him in the ass. The bullet hit the felon’s wallet, but didn’t penetrate through. It did however, provide enough pain in the Gluteus Maximus that the felons forward speed was severely hampered! 😉 memtb

Nope fighting in a jungle in dense foliage using WWII tactics was the biggest problem. Not chrome lining the barrel and chamber in a tropical environment was another problem and early on no cleaning kits to maintain the weapon

You didn't need a cleaning kit because the M16 was a self-cleaning rifle.

BS, no chrome lining in a tropical setting produced rust without oil the rust couldn't be helped

Of course, that was a joke. But that's what the early users were told.

Really?
Then you never experienced helo prop wash when landing in a dry rice paddy. Ripping your poncho liner off your rifle so you could use the damn thing wasn't very assault worthy.

Sorry went right over my head

There were some made by Matel, if I recall correctly. "Brrrrrrrr, brrrrrr, brrrrrr".
I remember getting issued an M-16 during basic training at West Point in 1985 and saying "Damn, this is exactly like the p.o.s. plastic rifle my 7 yr old brother was playing with when I left home last Tuesday - it just weighs more".

Funny that it evolved into Americas most popular rifle.

I have read about the total nightmare that was the XM16, the feud between MacNamara and Army Ordnance, the shenanigans, and the stupid orders that soldiers got, that did get many Americans killed. Criminal behavior, to say the least. There was even a congressional hearing in 1968, and heads should have rolled... but, of course, didn't.... It's pretty maddening, really, and I have no personal axe to grind in the situation.

They did, however, finally get the gun worked out. The M16 of 1967 is not quite the same thing as the AR today.

This^^^^.
Not to mention the powder type change, against the rifle makers objections.

Me and my brother had one of those each back in the 1960s or early 1970s. Looked just like the real ones. Made a machinegun sound, too.

Yep. The military had lots of powder left for the 7.62 NATO round, and wanted to use it, so they insisted the 5.56 be loaded with it. Wrong powder, so it clogged the guns up.

I have a few laying around from back in the day :-)

Type 56? That AK Is in great shape, surprising.

I was part of that...
I started in 1982. Then most dpeartments issed only a department approved sidearm. Revolvers were simple and effective. Still are.
I always shot revolvers better anyway. Even that Ruger Security Six.
I moved to a different department in 1987 and we were issued S&W 66 4". Great guns. For a long time we had the option of a personal gun. I carried a Sig P22 for a while before going to a Colt 1911 stainless. We just had to qualify with both the Smith and our gun. Eventually the department changed Chiefs and he dictated a department gun. Ruger P90 and then Glock 22.
I never though much of the 9mm.

That's why I said "Brrrrrr, brrrrrr, brrrrr".

I don't remember seeing any 9's back then but, did see a few .45's in mostly 1911's. Most cops I saw had S&W .357 Magnums.

There is no change without the shedding of blood.

Mackay,

I’d love to hear the details of that lowlight incident from years ago. I bet several other guys would too. Lessons learned in real time are always helpful and insightful, but also we are all guys who appreciate it and frankly, love storytime! And especially from a trusted and respected source.

Mackay, my post was in reference to this story. Sorry I missed quoting it.

Pfft.