"In 1866, Winchester improved on the Henry rifle and produced a model named after himself. The Winchester model 1866 fired 18 rounds, had a wooden forearm to make it less hot to handle, and contained the familiar side-loading port."

Good thing Cuomo wasn´t around in 1866 to tell them "you don´t need 18 rounds to kill a deer" !!!

God made man. Sam Colt made him equal.

Great artcle. They covered machine guns, but left out the invention of the semi automatics, which I believe was late in the 19th century.
I saw a drawing of a Winchester attempt at a semi auto rifle. They had a hinged paddle at the end of the barrel and a connecting rod going to the lever. The muzzle blast pushed the paddle, which operated the lever. A spring closed the lever with the next round. Cumbersome I´m sure, but a neat idea. Hope they changed the shape of the lever before trying it. Fingers could be lost.

A good start, and I´m sure Mr. Thomas had to edit like crazy to get his article down to this short length. It makes liberals insane, but the history of the longbow/crossbow/firearm is the history of Western civilization, and the history of war is the history of man. The modern dim/lib´s contempt of the military is a dangerous and shortsighted illness, and one that will have no good end for America.

Good overview, with a few minor technical errors.
One piece missing is the development of semiautomatic rifles, shotguns and handguns in the late 1890s and early 1900s for hunting and self defense.

John Browning´s development of the US Army Model of 1911 .45 semiauto pistol was a mind boggling breakthrough. There are more than 20 different companies manufacturing this 1911 design today with only minor improvements to sights and such. Try to think of any other device sold in 1911 that is in wide production and still considered a good tool today.

Semiautomatic rifles and shotguns were patented in 1890s and commonly available for hunting around about 1905 or so. The military lagged behind, only issuing a semiauto battle rifle just prior to WW2, the famous M1 Garand rifle.
This talk of semiauto rifles and handguns as a "new dangerous" development is total hogwash, they have been available for more than 100 years. Even the much maligned SEMIautomatic AR15 - sometimes said to be some sort of a new problem, was first sold to civilians almost half a century ago, and is extremely common as a hunting and self defense rifle today.

Re: "This talk of semiauto rifles and handguns as a ´new dangerous´ development is total hogwash, they have been available for more than 100 years."

>> Exactly!

The Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR) was already for service in the summer of 1918. So, semiautomatic, box magazine fed rifles are hardly a "new and dangerous" development in firearms. Further, in terms of sheer firepower and the amount of energy delivered upon a target, a BAR is a far more devastating firearm than any 5.56x45mm AR platform.