Pistol Patent Day

What the day is

Pistol Patent Day is observed on February 25, marking the United States patent granted to Samuel Colt in 1836 for a firearm with a revolving cylinder. This entry is about the industrial history, which is where the interest lies.

Origin and background

Colt's first venture failed. The company he founded on the patent went bankrupt within six years, because the product was expensive, the market was small, and he had no way to make the guns cheaply. What rescued him was a large government order during the Mexican-American War, and what he did with that order is the part that matters.

He built an armory in Hartford organized around interchangeable parts, precision machine tools and division of labor, and he was among the most effective promoters of that system. Before it, a firearm was fitted by a craftsman and its components belonged to that individual weapon; afterward, a part from one could replace the same part in another. This approach became known internationally as the American system of manufactures, and its consequences run far beyond firearms, into sewing machines, bicycles, typewriters and eventually the motor car. The technique of making things from standardized components is arguably more consequential than any single product made that way.

The patent itself illustrates something about monopoly. Colt held exclusive rights for over two decades through an extension, and competitors were effectively locked out of revolver manufacture in the United States for the duration. When the patent finally expired in 1857, rival designs appeared almost immediately, which is a fairly clean demonstration of how much a patent term shapes an industry.

Patent law has changed considerably since. Terms are now generally twenty years from filing, and the requirements for disclosure and novelty are far more demanding.

How to take part

• Read about the American system of manufactures, which reshaped industry generally.
• Look at how patent terms shape which industries have competition.
• Visit an industrial history museum, where early machine tools are usually on display.
• Search the patent database for something in your own field, which is free and revealing.