...but looking at all the things that Earhart removed from the plane, including even papers and her Colt pist0l
Colt pistol??? Did AE have a Colt pistol?? I would LOVE for AE to have had a Colt pistol. For Christmas I'm asking Santa for documentation that AE had a Colt pistol.
Merry Christmas, Ric!
If you read Mary Lovell's book I can understand your Christmas wish to Santa Claus.
Mary Lovell's wrote at page 267-268:
"...Her obsession with weight may have been taken to extreme length,
for according to Harry Balfour, radio operator at Lae, survival
equipment was also taken off. Balfour claimed that "she unloaded all her
surplus equipment on me including her [Very] pistol and ammunition,
books, letters and facility books"".
What Balfour actually said was:
"...[A]ll messages received from her were forwarded to her husband
together with some private papers she left with me at the radio station,
she also gave me her
automatic pistol and ammunition and some radio
facility books, but these I do not have now they became lost during the
war."
Letter from Balfour reprinted as exhibit 38 in Safford's book.
Long also writes:
"Earhart handed the package ...to Balfour...Balfour opened the paper and
inside was a 32-caliber handgun with a small box of ammunition."
Long, page 192.
I am curious who changed "automatic pistol" to "[Very] pistol",
was it Ms. Lovell or her source? She footnotes this information as
coming from Francis X. Holbrook, NA&SM Library, Amelia Earhart General
File: F0171300. The fact that "Very" was put in brackets shows that it was
deliberately changed, but why and by whom? Was it ignorance or political correctness?
There were plenty of .32 caliber automatic pistols available at the time, it was, and is, a popular caliber. Many manufacturers, FN, Savage, Star, Walther, Browning, etc., and one of the most popular in the U.S. was the Colt Pocket Pistol, model 1903. I had read somewhere (I don't remember where) that this was this model that AE carried. I have attached a photo of this type of automatic pistol.
We have all probably seen Colt Pocket Pistols in action. When Bogart shoots Edgar G. Robinson at the end of the 1948 movie "Key Largo" he is using one. Again when Bogart shoots Major Strasser at the end of the 1943 movie "Casablanca" Strasser falls to a bullet from a Colt Pocket Pistol. If you haven't seen this movie recently you should go out and rent it since you get the bonus of seeing an Electra taxiing at the Van Nuys airport, it's "the Lisbon plane."
gl
P.S.
Just for you Ric, because of your background in adjusting aircraft accidents, I am attaching a copy of my office's Christmas card.