Eiteljorg showcases historic pistols

 By Mary Lee Pappas / Star correspondent

Posted: February 12, 2010

President John F. Kennedy's initials are etched in the Colt New Frontier revolver engraved by Alvin A. White. - Photo provided by Eiteljorg Museum

Annie Oakley's steel, mother-of-pearl and gold revolver by Smith & Wesson is a 44-caliber handgun from the late 19th century. - Photo provided by Eiteljorg Museum

James H. Nottage, vice president and chief curatorial officer at the Eiteljorg Museum, has a history with some of the nearly 60 historic, one-of-a-kind firearms on display in a new exhibit at the museum.

"Pistols: Dazzling Firearms," a 5,000-square-foot exhibition featuring guns from the 1840s to present day, was assembled and is on loan from the Autry National Center in Los Angeles. Nottage was the center's first chief curator.

While at the Autry Center, Nottage acquired many of the pieces in "Pistols" from the Colt company collection, so he knows them intimately. But he stresses that the pieces are mostly about artistry.

"Technically they could be fired, but most of them have never been fired," said Nottage. "So it's really a platform for symbolism and ideas."

"If you think of paintings as being oil on canvas usually, you can think of these as steel canvases," he said about the intricate and lavish embellishments made to the pieces that render them more decadent than deadly. "They're engraved with chisels and hammers, inlaid with gold, platinum, silver. Grips are made from a range of materials -- rosewood to ivory to pearl to silver to gold. You can look at these pieces in terms of seeing how design motifs and techniques changed over time."

Several of the pieces were done by Tiffany from the 1860s to the present -- an art form of the privileged class, according to Nottage. There's also work by famed early 20th-century engravers such as Alvin White.

"Going back hundreds of years, firearms were expensive technology. Crowned heads of Europe and German principalities . . . sometimes had private gunsmiths," said Nottage. "The mechanism was expensive and the embellishment went along with that."

From Hollywoodto politics, varied aspects of American history are examined through the pistols, some owned and used by Western icons like James William Butler known as Wild Bill Hickok, Annie Oakley, George Custer and others.

"There are also presentation pieces done for Hollywood cowboys like Gene Autry, Tom Mix and Buck Jones, a silent film star," he said.

Colt created firearms for Presidents John Kennedy, Ronald Reagan and and Gerald Ford, whose guns can be seen in this show.

President Kennedy's New Frontier revolver has serial number PT109 after his Navy command boat, a solid gold inlaid PT boat and a presidential seal.

"Ronald Reagan and Lyndon Johnson have their brands on the guns also. In Reagan's case, (it's) the California bear," said Nottage of the metalwork.

Eiteljorg Museum, John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, Autry National Center, Gerald Ford, Lyndon Johnson, James H. Nottage, historic guns, pistols, firearms