Some of today’s shooters think any pistol that debuted in the year 1911 simply must be obsolete, and should be relegated to the museum instead of the working armory. Yet today there are more companies manufacturing 1911s—and more individuals keeping them as home-protection guns and carrying them as personal weapons—than ever before. Critics are at a loss to understand why this is. We who still carry them are not.
The Model 1911 was introduced in what would be its defining chambering, the .45 ACP. By the start of World War II, it had also been chambered for the deep-penetrating .38 Super (since 1929) and the .22 LR, in both conversion kits for standard guns and the dedicated Colt Ace pistol. Today we can buy 1911s at gun shops chambered for all three of those cartridges plus the 9mm, 10mm, .40 S&W, .357 SIG, .22 TCM, .50 GI, .45 Super, .45 Winchester Magnum and .357 Magnum in the Coonan pistol. In the past, 1911s were manufactured in 7.65mm Luger and 9mm Steyr for the overseas market, and in 9x29mm (aka the 9mm Winchester Magnum). Wildcat rounds developed for the 1911 include the .41 Avenger, the .460 Rowland and the .38-45. And I’m certain I’ve missed a few more.
Ultra-VersatileThe 1911 can do a number of things well. The late Hal Swiggett, the first editor of The Complete Book of Handguns, shot many deer with the Colt .45 ACP that always accompanied him on his travels. And while the pistol wasn’t designed for hunting, I killed my last wild hog with a Smith & Wesson SW1911 .45, and have Saint Patrick’d my share of poisonous snakes with various 1911s in 9mm through .45 ACP.
Target shooting has embraced the 1911 for a century or so. In Bullseye competitions under the auspices of the NRA, the 1911 is the standard choice for the .45-caliber third of the game, and it’s hugely popular in the centerfire third, and many competitors choose custom rimfire 1911s even for the third of the course dedicated to rimfire .22s.
From the custom Colt .45 ACP of the first winner in 1979, Ron Lerch, to the Smith & Wesson .38 Super of today’s perennial winner, Doug Koenig, the 1911 has won more times at Bianchi Cup matches, the flagship of NRA action pistol shooting, than any other handgun. These pistols are big at Police Pistol Combat (PPC) matches, too, in both 9mm and .45 ACP. They’re huge in Steel Challenge matches as well, and you’ll see more 10mm and .45 ACP 1911-style pistols than anything else at bowling-pin matches, where it takes powerful shots to clear heavy bowling pins completely off the tables.
On the defensive side of the house, police and law-abiding armed citizens have embraced the 1911 from the beginning. The legendary Texas Rangers bought their own Colt .45s (and later, to some degree, .38 Supers) so enthusiastically that they became something of a trademark gun for the agency, and Wilson Combat has even offered a dedicated Texas Ranger model. By the 1960s, forward-thinking police departments such as those of Los Alamitos and El Monte, California, had adopted the Colt Government Model .45 as standard issue, and many more departments authorized them as privately owned duty weapons or backup and off-duty guns.
Just as generations of American soldiers came back from their wars and bought bolt-action rifles after WWI, autoloading .30-caliber rifles after WWII and Korea, and AR-15s after Vietnam, all of those generations came home already trained to use the GI 1911 .45, and therefore many bought such guns to defend their homes or wear with their carry permits. The writings of Colonel Jeff Cooper in the 1950s and 1960s did much to popularize the .45 as what he called a “fighting handgun.”
Reasons 2 and 3 are here:
http://www.personaldefenseworld.com/2017/02/massad-ayoob-1911/#massad-ayoob-1911-1
