As the introduction of the SIG M250 potentially opens a new chapter in the U.S. Army's squad automatic weapon story, or more accurately, the GPMG role, it is worth looking back at the excitement around the M249 when it was adopted. The U.S. Army type-classified the M249 on February 1, 1982, ...
Editor’s Note: This piece was crafting as a special retro-style “mini-magazine” within the Winter 2026 print issue of The Armory Life. We styled it to look as though it had been published back when the author was a young teenager poring over his collection of Springfield Armory catalogs. Yo...
I have worked with Dr. Will Dabbs for much of my career as an editor and consider him to be both an exceptional contributor and a good friend. No matter the deadline or the assignment, I always know that I can count on him to deliver a well-rounded, thoroughly researched and — most importantly ...
One of the best firearms museums in the world, the Cody Firearms Museum in Cody, WY, has launched a new book shining a light on a part of their incredible collection which rarely gets displayed!
The names of firearms designers such as John Moses Browning, Mikhail Kalashnikov and Eugene Morrison Stoner are synonymous with iconic firearms. Stoner was a prolific firearms designer who was responsible for the AR-7 U.S. Air Force survival rifle, the AR-10 rifle, the SR-25, and, of course, the ...
Welcome to today’s Photo of the Day! Here we have Winchester’s attempt to build a better Garand. It failed, and in failing it handed us the M1 Carbine, so I would call that a fair trade. Winchester bought Ed Browning’s self-loading patents before he died in 1939. By 1938 the com...
Welcome to today’s Photo of the Day! Here we have a rifle from the Browning nobody talks about. Jonathan Edmund “Ed” Browning was John Moses Browning’s half brother and spent roughly fifty years as the model maker at the family shop in Ogden. Everybody knows JMB. Nobody kn...
“It was scary, you know? The damnedest thing…” The old Marine flicked at a bright yellow tie he was wearing. “We were ordered to take Atabrine to prevent malaria. Most of us did that but it tended to turn our eyes and skin a bright yellow. And then a rumor started that the stuff would Rea...
The M14 rifle holds a significant place in the history of American military firearms, serving as a bridge between the battle rifles of World War II and the US’ military’s modern assault rifles. Developed in the post-World War II era, the M14 was the standard-issue rifle for the U.S. m...
Welcome to today’s Photo of the Day! Here we have a rifle that lost its trials and still set the course for every US service rifle since. This is an early Artillerie-Inrichtingen AR-10 in 7.62 NATO, built in the Netherlands in the Portuguese contract pattern. Eugene Stoner had the AR-10 in ...