By Dan Shea
While we’re figuring out how to deal with whatever anti-firearms action is coming at us due to the re-election of Barack Obama, we still have to live our lives. Nothing changed that dramatically other than a lot of people started to realize you can’t run against Santa Claus. It seems apparent that America has finally crossed that point where more people are willing to vote for what the government will give them, than will vote for what our country used to stand for – personal responsibility and rugged individualism. Unfortunately what goes hand in hand with the socialistic re-distribution of wealth is the evisceration of our constitutionally guaranteed rights; including the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. That said, I get to see the strength of many of our young people every day, and I’m not giving up yet.
I don’t see any way to live without being involved in the firearms community and sharing knowledge about weapons and history, so we’re just going to, “Keep on keepin’ on” as the saying goes. Here are some things that you should be aware of: The goal of the online magazine/archive at www.SmallArmsOfTheWorld.com is not to go completely digital, it is to preserve the articles, make them searchable for the readers, and to build a massive library of searchable photos, documents, manuals, research papers, and manufacturers’ pamphlets. Anything to do with our community that’s able to be put online and preserved digitally, is game to be shared with our subscribers.
We’ve been a bit remiss in how we described what we’re doing, so I want to take a bit of space to explain the things that are so great about the SAW site.
1- Our older columns are now being put online and are searchable. That means The Legal Side, New Products, Industry News, Machine Gun Memorabilia, etc., will all eventually be searchable by subscribers.
2- Every week we put two or three new articles online, and one complete back issue of SAR with the articles in a format that is not just a PDF copy, it’s the text, searchable, with all the photos in high resolution, and their captions are searchable. After you sign in, choose an article, and you can read the text. On the right of your screen, will be thumbnails of the photos – just click on them and they’ll expand, with captions, and you can scroll through them, and save them to your computer if you want.
3- The massive archives at LMO, including much of Colonel Chinn’s, Tom Nelson’s, Dan Musgrave’s, Colonel Jarrett’s, Dolf Goldsmith’s and many other people’s libraries are being digitized with proper captioning. Go ahead and try a search for SPIW, or M60, or Maxim, and see how many photos, manuals, research documents, and articles you turn up. If you’re signed in, you can access these and save them for your own use.
4- Signing in: Usually, your name with a period in the middle and a case sensitive password have been supplied to you. If you have trouble getting online, just contact us. We’ll help, and it will be worth it. You can change your user name and password when you get signed in, like almost any other site.
5- Scroll down. There is more on the pages than just what you see. And to get back to the home page and log out, just click on the upper left block that says “SA” and you’ll be back.
6- Keep checking back in. Every two or three days new stuff is being added.
7- The newest issue of SAR- the day it leaves the printer, usually around the 20th of the month, the entire issue goes online. Subscribers can read all the articles from that moment forward.
8- If you’re only paying $39.95 you’re just getting the physical quarterly magazine. For another ten bucks, you get both the online resource and archives, and the quarterly magazine. If you’re paying $19.95, you are online for a year and no physical magazine.
We’re really pleased with where this is going, and anticipate that 2013 will be our best year ever! Thanks for sticking with us, and participating in SAR- Dan
This article first appeared in Small Arms Review V17N1 (March 2013)
