tyzak09

I guess I am an old man. I bought my first Ruger a Mark 1 .22 in 1955 for $39.95 and my first Blackhawk 357 in 1966 for $80.00. I have several others both hand guns and rifles. It seems the price has skyrocketed the past 5 years. Rugers are still reasonable in relation to other brands. I also have a S&W Airweight snubby made of titanium and aluminum alloy. I paid $400.00 and to buy one now is almost $1000.00. This is a great pocket carry gun but not fun to shoot. It hurts my arthritic hands. I used to carry a Colt .45 Model 80 cocked and locked. You need practice to do this so you don't shoot yourself. I carried a .45 in the Marines.

Waveform

Great memories..... I shot a friends S&W like yours and after one cylinder of .357 I gave it back. It hurt my younger non-arthritic hands! That's a snotty little gun in .357.

jdavis

I hear you! I purchased several Colt Pythons in the late 1970s for $390 each. Wish that I had kept them. However, when you consider the drop in the value of the U.S. dollar since then, it isn't that much of a surprise.

James6591

Got me to thinking what everything cost forty years ago when I started drinking and driving (not necessarily at the same time).....
Fuel and alcohol were a miniscule fraction of what they cost today.

bwinters

My first ruger blackhawk convertible 45 colt/acp cost me 147 dollars pus tax in 1977 and it was about 10 days take home pay. I purchased a ppk in 1983 and sold it for more than I paid for it 10 years later due to inflation and currency change.

smithnframe

My first model 29-2 was retail price of 140.00 according to S&W but during the 70's the going rate was 350.00 with the presentation case. A Ruger NMB convertible 45 colt/45acp was 89.50 I think! Ahh......the good old days!

ditto1958

In 1977 my paycheck for 2 weeks (10 work days) was about $180. There was a place called Mars that served food similar to McDonalds. A hamburger, fries and a Coke were $.96. Gas was $.55 a gallon and we thought that was a highway robbery price.

LimaCharlie

The first gun I ever bought was around Christmas 1962. I ordered a British .303 Enfield rifle for $29.95 plus two boxes of ammo from the Sears Christmas catalog. The mailman delivered them about ten days later. I sure wish I still had it.

The first handgun I ever bought was a Ruger Super Blackhawk 10.5" barrel .44 magnum in 1966 from my brother-in-law for $80.00. I sold it a couple of years later for $100.00.

The Ruger is the only gun I have ever had to draw as a civilian. In 1967, I was returning from a date with my girlfriend and took a shortcut through Northeast Denver about 3:00 am. Two guys tried to run me off the road with their car. I had been shooting the Ruger with a friend earlier that day and it was under the front seat and loaded. I drew it and put it out the window. The guys apologized and said they thought I was someone else. They left and I put it back under the seat.

Kudzu

The first handgun I purchased was a Ruger Standard .22 in the early sixties. If I recall correctly, I paid $27.50 which was cost at that time. I loved that gun. It was stolen about twenty years ago. I still have the extra magazine in its original box.

dV8r

Bought my first handgun in 1969, a used Ruger Standard $20.00.

bearcatter

My first handgun was a used, blue .38 Speed Six for $120 in 1979. Soon after I got a 4 inch stainless Security-Six, new, for $315. I have to remember that at the time I was making $8.50 an hour, good money in those days.

I had a nearly new two bedroom furnished apartment, 15 minutes from the beach in the Florida panhandle, for $220 a month. Ah, the good old days........

3482jl

We must be about the same vintage. I remember buying a brand new Python in the early 80s for around $400, and my first Browning Superposed about the same time also for around $400.

dubshooter

Delivered a gun to your house? What about FFL?? There must have been so much gun violence back then!

LimaCharlie

I was sixteen when I ordered it. I grew up in rural New Mexico in the 1950s and 1960s. It was not unusual to see people in the US Post Office open carrying a revolver with a belt full of reloads in the loops. The only gun violence reported in the area was from deer, elk, squirrels, and rattle snakes.

scattershot

Yep, I remember the first pistol I ever bought for myself. It was a Colt Official Police, for the princely sum of $69.95. Of course, you could buy .22 ammo at 7-11 then, for .39 cents a box, as I recall. You could walk into a Walgreens store and look through a barrel of surplus Mausers and SMLEs for $19.95, take your pick and take it home.

Punks and criminals were dealt with back then, too, so maybe that explains the relative lack of crime.