This Colt long-slide was crafted by legendary AMU armorer John Miller, but she is really a gun by committee. The slide was welded up by Jim Hoag, using a new GI Colt National Match slide. Hoag made the front sight wider to mate perfectly with the Bomar rear .125 notch, for a perfect target site picture. John Miller out of Marietta Ohio took over from there. He fit the Hoag slide and a very scarce Smith & Wesson 6 inch NM barrel to a Colt 70 series frame. The trigger guard was done at an angle to mirror the angle of the cocking serrations and the grip of the frame. In the late 1970s and early 1980s long slides were all the rage, that is until compensated 1911s by Brown, Wilson, Plaxco, and others hit the scene. This is a very special gun, made by two legends for a third legend–Mr. Ken Hackathorn. The gun was published in Pat Sweeney’s 1911 book on page 126 with pictures by a 4th legend –Mr. Ichiro Nagata. My iPhone pictures suck but at least I indexed the grips screws in my picture, so I win. It was Southern California back in the day, so she is shod in priceless coffin grips by the venerable Jean St. Henri, who was Hoag’s buddy. Today’s post is dedicated to John who passed away recently at 82 years of age. John served for 32 years in the US Army, retiring as Chief Warrant Officer 2. John served two tours in Vietnam, maintaining military weapons shops in Vungtau and Saigon. After the war Miller worked for decades as a special deputy for the Washington County Sheriff’s Office as the founding member of the special response team. John was an expert marksman and won countless national IDPA and NRA national matches. John was renown for his “hard fit” AMU method of fitting barrels, and if you own a 1911 made by @thelarryvickers @108performance, Novaks, or Nastoff…you can thank John Melville Miller, who mentored all of them and more. These guns have stories, I aim to tell them. Golf glove by @footjoy –marketing guy please send me 3 more in left hand large.
Scattered Shots 
Lady Lawdy…I’m a revolver Fudd, but when I see a longslide 1911, my heart goes all aflutter, my own 1911 being a longslide, of course.
That piece is really something special
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Who made your 1911, LSWCHP? I know you’ve said Colts almost never find their way to the Land Down Under.
And I agree—longslide 1911s do look wicked cool.
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My gun is an STI Targetmaster. It’s a superbly accurate piece though requires regular careful cleaning due to tight tolerances. Can’t get them any more after STI became Staccato.
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It’s fascinating to me that STI distributed to Oz but Colt doesn’t. STI was pretty niche here, whereas Colt is fairly mainstream. I think the Staccato rebrand was part of trying to make themselves a little more mainstream. Just not in Oz, I guess.
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I know. It’s weird. S&W are way dominant here. Everybody shoots Smiths. After them you can readily get SIG, Glock, CZ, and then minor players like Manurhin, Springfield Armoury, Canik, STI/Staccato, Korth are all to be seen on the range. But in decades of shooting at ranges in Australia at state, national and international matches, I’ve seen one guy who had an old Colt Diamondback, and that’s it.
It’s really bizarre. More people here shoot Manurhins, of all things, than Colts. WTF? We’re a small market, but that still equates to tens of thousands of handgun shooters. Colt simply abandoned the market here decades ago. I’ve never even seen an ad in a magazine for a Colt gun, ever.
As a result, I currently own 4 S&W guns, along with a SIG, the STI and a Steyr, and I’ve probably owned a dozen or so other Smiths, CZ etc. But nary a Colt.
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