Nice gun, Ben.
About 30 years ago, we did a bunch of remodel work for Paul Coker (famous illustrator for TV and Mad Magazine) and his dad. The dad, Paul Coker Sr. had a large gun collection, including a 1911 Colt 45 Army issue.
Paul Sr. was going into a nursing home and Paul Jr. didn’t really like guns in the house, so he decided to sell them.
My dad loved handguns, so he asked Paul how much he would take for the entire collection. There were rifles, including a Winchester model 94 30-30, shotguns, including a double barrel 12ga. and a Remington 870, and many old S&W .38’s in all barrel lengths. There was even an old knife and sheath in the collection. All of the guns were in perfect condition with many in the original boxes.
Paul’s reply was “I have no idea what the guns are worth; I just want to get rid of them. Is five thousand dollars too much?” Dad and I both nearly fainted! I didn’t know much about gun prices at the time, but Dad did and said “no; that’s not too much at all.” So Dad bought the collection, and after looking up as many of the guns as he could find in his “gun price book” found out he had bought them for about ten cents on the dollar!!
Dad wanted to sell a majority of the guns but wasn’t sure how to go about it, so I made a deal with him. He could take any of the guns he really wanted to keep and I would buy the rest from him for $5000; the same price he paid for the whole collection. He agreed so he got several free guns and I still got a great deal on the rest of the collection. I ended up keeping a bunch of guns and still sold the rest for about what I paid Dad!
I sold the 1911 Colt 45 for $500 to my concrete man, sight unseen! (I realized right away I had sold it too cheap)
Oh well; he got a good deal, too! (Wish I had it back, now…) 🥴

When I bought my first handgun in 1976 I had gotten Layed off from work. Had my eye on Colt 45 at a very reasonable price
But was concerned on cost of ammo too. I ended up buying a Browning 22 made in 1974. One of last models made in Belgium with the idea I’ll buy Colt later on. Even lied to my wife how much I paid for handgun. (100.00 ,actual cost was 165.00). Money was thin and new born ect. Anyway never bought the Colt and wished I did. As time went on and many moons later I never did get the Colt. But I have a good variety of fire arms to pass onto my son. Have 3 kids and 5 Gr kids and only one that’s interested in firearms. I just hope he appreciates them. Bottom line “Damn wished I have bought that Colt that reminded me of my days in Marines”. Lol
🌴😎🌴

Papa , that brought out some good memories .
Young husband , in military, always broke
But I still found a way to follow my passion of firearms.
Distance work one weekend , handgun the next.
Then I lucked into a deal where I got to have Uncle Sam hook me up with some pretty cool toys and more ammo than I really wanted to expend.
Had an instructor , best way to describe him rhymes with Lard grass.
Tough ole dude.
“ not even close to being good enough. Do it again”
Hear this a couple dozen times a day, ya start to pay attention.
Ole boy sure knew how to teach a guy to shoot!!
I noticed he didn’t say that all that often anymore.
Yea. Old memories.

I have a Colt 1911 Us Army manufactured in 1917 as per Colt archives which cost $100 for them to research it. Well worth it. The Colt was passed down to me from my father when he passed in 93. I know he owned at least 30 years prior to that. It’s in very good condition and the last I shot in 2012 it functioned flawlessly thru 100 rounds of 230 grain military match grade ball ammo. I have been offered some $$$$ for it but probably pass it on down. Will send pics as soon as I can figure out how to.