Ruger's 50th Anniversary: .357 Magnum Blackhawk

American Handgunner, Jan-Feb, 2007 by John Taffin

It was the year of years in the middle of the decade we now call the Fabulous Fifties. That wonderful year nestled in the middle of that wonderful decade was 1955. It's the year Disneyland opened; Dem Bums, the Brooklyn Dodgers beat the New York Yankees in the World Series, and understandable music was provided by Pat Boone, Tennessee Ernie, Nat King Cole, the McGuire Sisters, Mitch Miller and a young fellow by the name of Elvis Presley. For me it was the beginning of my senior year at John R. Buchtel High School and all of us went to see Blackboard Jungle and cheered on Mister Roberts as the captain's palm tree went over the side.

TV was still in its infancy and all black and white, four gallons of gas cost the same as one gallon of milk, and great changes abounded in the automotive industry. Chevrolet went from a stodgy family sedan with six cylinders to V-8 powered cars specially aimed at youthful drivers. While Ford not only brought out one of the most beautiful cars of all times the Crown Victoria Hardtop, they also introduced the Thunderbird.

Great Changes

The first magazine dedicated exclusively to firearms, GUNS, arrived in January 1955 and before the end of the decade it would be followed by several imitators. Colt introduced what would become their Cadillac of Sixguns, the .357 Magnum Python; while S&W countered with three great new models, the .45 ACP 1955 Target, the .357 Combat Magnum and just before December disappeared, the first .44 Magnum. Ruger, which had started in 1949 with a 9-shot .22 semiauto, offered a .22 Single-Six in 1953, and then in 1955 upgraded the Single-Six to an adjustable-sighted .357 Magnum called the Blackhawk.

Sweet Dreams

The first I knew of the Blackhawk was from a life-sized picture in Outdoor Life of the 4 5/8" .357 Magnum single-action sixgun. We lived in a very small house at the time and my bedroom on the second floor had walls going up about four feet and then angling towards the center. There, above my bed to be the last thing seen at night and the first thing seen in the morning, was that picture of Ruger's .357 Magnum Blackhawk.

That was 1955 and it would be 1957 before I ever saw the real thing. By then I already had a charge account at Boyle's Gun Shop and when that Blackhawk arrived it became my first new centerfire single action sixgun. Boyle's had an outdoor range where we all gathered on Saturday afternoons to shoot our Ruger .22 Single-Sixes and Marlin .22 leverguns. Along with that .357 Blackhawk came a box of ammunition. Up to this point I had never fired a .357 and had yet to see a .44 Magnum. Many complain about gun deliveries being slow today; in the 1950s it took years, not months, to see many in the new models.

Lessons

The cylinder of that .357 Blackhawk was loaded with factory 158-gr. .357s, I coiled my little finger under the butt, rested my hand on a cement block just as I did with the .22 Single-Six, and squeezed off a round. I don't know what hurt worse, my finger being smashed between the butt of the cement block as the Blackhawk recoiled, or the sharp pain my unprotected years experienced. By the following Thursday that pain in my finger was gone, however the ears still hurt. That was probably the beginning of the level of deafness I experience today.

The box of .357 Magnum ammunition was cherished, and once I had 50 empty cases I ordered a Lyman #358429 single-cavity bullet mold. My long suffering mother put up with the lead splashes all over her kitchen stove and the side of the refrigerator and I began to learn about bullet casting. I had a Lyman #310 Tong Tool complete with a bullet sizing die and a powder scoop inscribed "15 gr. #2400" and I was in the business of reloading my own ammunition.

Those 50 cases were loaded using the #2400 powder scoop and the Keith bullet, and I soon learned to never load ammunition without trying it in the chambers first. Most of the cases, which could not be full-length resized with the Lyman #310 tool, would not re-enter the chambers of the .357 Blackhawk. Those that would were too long as the bullet, which Keith had designed in the early 1930s for the .38 Special, protruded through the end of the Blackhawk's cylinder when loaded in Magnum cases. Obviously, none of this was going to work.

Doing It Right

A Lyman All American single stage reloading press was ordered along with dies for both the .357 Magnum and .45 Colt, both of which included full-length sizing dies. The 173 gr. #358429 Keith bullet would not work with .357 Magnum brass in the Ruger .357 Blackhawk, however it not only worked fine in .38 Special brass, the latter was much easier to acquire and definitely much cheaper. My first .357 Magnum Blackhawk became a Heavy Duty .38 Special using the standard Keith load of 13.5 grains of #2400. This is a very heavy load, one I only used in the .357 Blackhawk and is much too heavy for any currently-produced .38 Specials. In fact it's actually higher in pressure and muzzle velocity than much of the .357 Magnum factory ammunition offered today. It worked fine in the .357 Blackhawk.