A month ago, I visited the range with my former police agency to qualify for my LEOSA card, also known as H.B. 218, for off-duty carry. I mixed in at the firing line with officers I knew and some I didn’t. When I strapped on my gun belt, one of the guys with whom I had worked was taken aback. “What is that?” he asked, staring at my waist. “A revolver, of course,” I answered. “But why?” he inquired.
I went to the Police Academy in 1987. Back then, all 25 police agencies in my Florida county still shot wheelguns. My department was the very first to transition to the autoloader, so I was taught on both the revolver and automatic platforms. I was issued a Smith & Wesson Model 64 revolver and a Model 669 in auto, representing each respective weapons system. I was familiarized on both. The revolver was turned back into the armorer after the Academy.
When I shot for the Academy’s coveted Top Gun Title with the Smith 669, I was a guinea pig. No one on this range had shot an automatic as an on-duty firearm qualification. In the final round, I was pitted against an officer from another department who was shooting a 4-inch-barreled revolver. Instructors bet against me. In the end, I dropped one shot off the target zone at the 25-yard line and came out in second place. The double-single trigger pulls, and shorter sight picture of the 3 1/2-inch barrel on my Smith & Wesson 669 accounted against me, so I reasoned.
The Florida state firearms qualification, required for a LEOSA card, has changed from previous years and is a challenge for the wheelie. The course is designed for modern autoloaders with high capacities. It can doubtfully be completed with a five-shot snubbie unless you are named Miculek. The timed mid-qual reload is a bugger.
With my vintage Smith Model 64, a stainless six-shot, and a collection of HKS speed loaders, I braved the qualification against the kids and their modern Sig P320s (I know, I know). I gotta say I was sweating bulle…well, profusely. This was not going to be a cake walk.
The sights on my Model 64 are ramp and notch, not the tritium three-dots of a newer gun. My eyes are old, so obtaining the sights is not realistic without readers, but then the target becomes blurry. “Compromise, compromise” is the mantra of a sixty-plus-year-old. I hate these born after 2000 Gen-whatever’s.
In fact, the only other cop that has toed up to the line with a wheelgun was one of my former Police Chiefs. As an officer, he was my first SWAT team leader and then, as Chief, promoted me to sergeant late in my career. Now nearing 70, he can still handle himself with a firearm. He has my respect.
To cut to the chase, I received my HB 218 revolver card without a hitch, and my blue B-21E was better than most of the other shiny badges that day. With my Springfield Armory Echelon, fitted with a Trijicon RMR optic, I had already gotten the auto card, but the revolver was my white whale, at least for this year.
When I go back to the gun range next year, I may take my secret weapon, a Smith & Wesson Model 10 wheelgun, tricked out with green parkerization and a Crimson Trace laser grip. That’ll even the odds in the target acquisition department. But some speed loader practice will still be necessary to win the day…
Randall
