Republican Gov. Greg Abbott last weekend signed a resolution forwarded to his desk by the Texas lawmakers that makes the original 1847 Colt Walker the official handgun of the Lone Star State.
The measure, HCR 15, was filed last December by state Rep. Ben Leman, R-Andersonville, and unanimously passed the House Committee on Culture, Recreation & Tourism before sailing through the legislature as a whole. Abbott signed it Saturday, promising that, “I’ll be signing more gun laws real soon.”
A hulking 4.5-pound 44-caliber revolver, the Walker was so-named after famed Texas Ranger Capt. Samuel Walker, and only about 1,100 of the handguns were manufactured by Eli Whitney for Colt. Some 1,000 were sent to Texas and 100 made for the commercial market. The gun was a collaboration between Walker and Colt, based on the latter’s earlier .36-caliber Paterson design, a five-shot revolver that weighed only half of what the Model 1847 would. Read more…
