Cecil Pinkerton Part 1

In 1981, I was very adrift. I realized I fit in nowhere and the liberalism of my teen and college years looked more ridiculous by the week. My role models were my karate teacher and a couple of my professors who would not lie down for the great brown wave of leftism taking over academia, but none of us were close and then my girlfriend broke up with me. Hard times. But I refused to get all depressed about it and kept a positive attitude for the most part. One day, I was at the San Bernardino police pistol range, a lovely facility I went to a few times a month to work on my shooting skills, and my little Beretta .32 kept jamming. Constant failure to feed jams, driving me bats. Out of frustration, I turned to the guy on the next lane, and blurted out "does anyone know a good gunsmith around here?"

Oh yeah... See that old guy down there at the end of the line? He's the best there is. So I made the Beretta safe and went down to the end of the shooting line to ask this gunsmith for help. Wizened old man, clearly in his 80's, skinny arms and liver spots on the back of his hands, shooting a 1911 .45, and all the bullets seemed to be going into the same hole on the target... hmm. When he was done, he turned around and sized me up.. 

Excuse me, I'm Don Cicchetti and my little Beretta here keeps failing to feed, can you help? He took the Beretta, and looking askance at the aftermarket magazine said "you don't need a gunsmith, you need an original magazine. These aftermarket magazines are terrible. Go to the gun show in Pomona and find a couple of original mags and your problem will be over." Wow, thanks I said. He said "if you need a gunsmith someday, here is my card."

Cecil Pinkerton, but they call me Pinky, he said, extending his hand. I shook it and said goodbye. Nice guy I thought and I'll bet he's right about the mags.

Next gun show, I picked up a couple of original Beretta magazines for a few bucks and the gun ran perfectly from then on.

So, when I was looking for a nice .357 I gave him a call for recommendations. He invited me over, and not only sold me a lovely S&W 65 in 4-inch, but he became a good friend over the next few months. Every Friday afternoon, I would go over to his house and shoot the bull and he would tell me stories. He had been a guard (being a Pinkerton and all) on the trains near the turn of the 20th century in the old west. Yes, a cowboy. A real one, not a Hollywood one.

Learned an enormous amount of penicillin-grade wisdom from him, and I never again regretted checking out of the hippie era.

I learned so much from him. Pinky stories? I got a bunch of 'em. 

More to come...