William Mason (gunsmith)
William Mason | |
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Born | Oswego, New York, U.S. | January 30, 1837
Died | July 17, 1913 Worcester, Massachusetts, U.S. | (aged 76)
Occupation(s) | Inventor, machinist, gunsmith |
William Mason (January 30, 1837 – July 17, 1913) was a patternmaker,
Remington
Mason began his career as an apprentice patternmaker, eventually working in the arms industry for Remington Arms. While at Remington, on November 21, 1865, he received U.S. patent 51,117, for a swing-out cylinder for easy loading and the star ejector mechanism to eject spent cartridge cases, a design used in 1896 by S&W for the .38 Hand Ejector (M&P and S&W Model 10).[2]
Colt
Mason left Remington Arms in 1866 to work for Colt as the superintendent of the armory. Along with
The revolver was chosen by the Army in 1872, with the first order shipping in the summer of 1873 for 8,000 revolvers.[4] After the success of the Colt Single Action Army and Colt's conversion of existing percussion revolvers to Richards-Mason conversions, Mason went on to design Colt's smallest revolver, "The New Line" in 1874. There were five variants, each differing in size and caliber, but all using a breechblock designed by Mason.[5]
While Colt had first developed the concept of a "
His final design for Colt was the Colt M1889, a collaboration with Carl J. Ehbets for a revolver with a swing-out cylinder. Ehbets continued to perfect the idea for 7 years after Mason left Colt for Winchester.[6]
Winchester
Mason left Colt to work for the
Mason was an inaugural member of the
References
- ^ ISBN 978-0-89689-455-6.
- ISBN 978-0-8263-4280-5. Retrieved April 9, 2020 – via Google Books.
- ISBN 978-0-87349-576-9.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-87349-953-8.
- ISBN 978-1-85367-692-5.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-85109-470-7.
- ISBN 978-1-58574-307-0.
- ISBN 978-0-7858-1893-9.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-8262-1905-3.
- ^ a b Roe, Joseph Wickham (1916). "The Colt Workmen - Pratt & Whitney". English and American Tool Builders. New Haven: Yale university press. pp. 173–174.
- ^ "William Mason". Hartford Courant. July 21, 1913. p. 9. Retrieved April 9, 2020 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ "Proceedings of the Hartford, Conn Meeting May 1881". Transactions of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. 2. American Society of Mechanical Engineers. 1881. Retrieved November 19, 2011.