Picked up this interesting little piece from a friend at the Indy 1500 gun show this past weekend.
It's a Smith & Wesson .32 Safety Hammerless 1st Model (popularly known as the "Lemon Squeezer" for the grip safety on the backstrap.) This one, however, has been professionally and painstakingly converted from .32 S&W to .22 rimfire.
The most obvious visual clue is the spring-loaded underbarrel ejector rod assembly,
à la the Colt Peacemaker.
The pinned half-moon thumbnail of the factory front sight has been replaced with a Marble unit.
The barrel has been bored out and sleeved to .22 caliber.
Here's a detail of the rear of the ejector rod assembly as well as the cylinder face, where you can see the faint traces of the .22 chamber sleeves inset into the bored-out .32 chambers.
The sleeved chambers from the breech end. The cylinder's serial number is much later than the frame's.
I would LOVE to know the history of this gun. The work is immaculate and the re-nickel job is quite nice.The frame dates to 1898, making it an antique, although the cylinder is later, so it's unlikely that the conversion dates to the twenty-year stretch from 1881-1901 where S&W didn't have any .22s in their lineup.
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