Not sure about this little pistol.

IfindFe

Junior Member
Joined
Aug 26, 2018
Messages
33
Location
Milton-Freewater, Oregon
Found at an old home site. House was probably there from 1870 to ???? Cow pasture now. No modern trash. No cans, bottle caps, pull tabs or foil.

Not a single coin at the site. The Merc dime is just for size reference. These were poor farmers living in the middle of nowhere.

The pistol is heavy. It's harder than lead, so it is probably alloyed with tin. I found two comparisons on the internet, but I don't have faith in either. One had it listed as a pipe tamper, the other as a candy topper (with question marks). I think it would make a poor pipe tamper because the butt is hollow. I do not understand the candy topper reference.

I'm betting that somebody in the forum can give me a positive i.d.
 

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I think it's a little squirt gun. There was a rubber bulb that attached to the butt of the pistol. I've seen it somewhere before. Here's a similar one:
 

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DougF is correct. It is a mini squirt gun. I found one very much like it last year on a 1900 era homesite. Best info I have found indicates 1930s vintage . Cool find!
 

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Nice find. I think it’s amazing that the thread was started in middle of the night and the find was IDed a few hours later. Great job by poster and the IDer.
 
Thanks to DougF and MTtrashdigger for the identification, and to the others for your replies.

Hunting some of these poor farmstead sites can be a bit demoralizing. Finding a toy, or even a fragment of a toy, always changes how I feel about the site. This little pistol made my day.
 
It is a cool find.
Will a bulb off of a cheap manual blood pressure fit it?
It would be neat to make it functional again.
 
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