History of Silencers – ‘Gun Stories’

By G&A Online Editors

Imagine an inexpensive and well tested device that can make shooting any guns safer, reduce recoil by as much as half, and eliminate the single biggest problem in all of shooting: the flinch. Now, imagine that you can’t buy this amazing device without the permission of the federal government. Today we’re talking very quietly about silencers.

Silencers, or sound suppressors as they’ve been called in recent years, are covered under the National Firearms Act of 1934, the same law that controls machine guns, short barreled rifles, and short barreled shotguns. Therefore, suppressors are controlled. That doesn’t mean that you can’t own one. In most states, it’s perfectly legal.

The first silences were built by Hiram Percy maxim, the son of Hiram Stephen Maxxam who invented the Maxim machine gun.

The first Maxim silencers or marketed in 1909. The ads in popular magazines showed Victorian ladies and gentlemen target shooting in their front yards, or in one ad shooting matches in the house. While silencers virtually disappeared from the civilian market, they resurfaced in World War II as a tool of the Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency.

A number of unique suppressed weapons were made for military special forces. …Read the Rest

Source:: Guns and Ammo