pokute
Active Member
Roper had an interesting life, worked for S&W for 40 years, retired in 1931 and did nice work for H&R. His two books published in 1945 and the one in 1949, Experiments of a HANDGUNNER, deserve a wider audience. I don't know when he died, but would have been 79 in 1949.
Experiments of a Handgunner is brilliant. It's one of those, like Bullets Flight by Mann, and Sharpe's Handloading that you can go back to endlessly for "new" ideas. I don't know how the relationship with John Harrington came about, but Harrington let Roper run naked sprinkling fairy dust all over the H&R line. Roper contributed a bunch of leftover ideas from H&R to the 1939 American Rifleman, and that's how your very special 199 came to be. There was clearly somebody at H&R who was fascinated by the S&W Model 3 target (as was Roper) - Maybe it was John Harrington?
S&W Model 3 Target - The first purpose built target pistol: