In responding to my post on “Gangster Squad,” Earl Boebert raised the interesting question about whether officers used a one-handed or two-handed grip in the 1940s.
For comparison, here’s a picture from Jack Webb’s “The Badge” (1958) showing LAPD cadets at the pistol range using a one-handed grip. Feet apart, knees bent, in a slight crouch.
ladailymirror.com 
Right again! It’s a whole bunch of things that add up to say, this subject and this story was not researched very well. But at the end of the day, the ticket sales told the story.
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I guess I’m old-fashioned as well as old, but I’m still capable of being surprised at how people can tolerate doing a sloppy job when doing a good one is so easy. It’s not like you have to get up off your sorry whatever to find pictures of cops and robbers in Los Angeles during the Cohen era. Larry also noted the anachronism of a detective using a semiautomatic pistol. My father hated them, telling me many times that more people were shot by accident with one of those things than were ever shot on purpose with revolvers — a sentiment echoed by many of his law enforcement buddies.
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I wonder about those poses — seems to be such a bad idea for successfully aiming at and hitting a target. The only thing I can think of is that this was meant to be the end point of quick-drawing the weapon from their belt holsters, then minimizing your own profile.
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You know, with all the remarks about how bad this movie I am going to have to watch it now, but only when it comes on cable. (I wouldn’t pay to see it) If it is as bad as The Black Dahlia I won’t have to sit through much of it. (I paid to see that!)
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Now that I’m a retiree, I cringe watching all these new period movies.
I remember when we started using mouth-to-mouth resuscitation for water rescues, when the use of the term 24/7 became the rage (and similar phraseology), the high five, and “valley speak.”
Sadly, I find myself not really enjoying these period pics because these errors just keep popping up.
I guess a lot of these script writers are just too young.
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Where was the Technical Director when making this movie. My father was the one several times for Dragnet, Jack Web always wanted to be accurate (maybe corny) but accurate in his portrayal of LAPD. Inaccuracies in movies give people a false belief of “how it is” or was. Shame on the makers of this movie for falsifying this important historical past of L.A.
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Yes, Webb was a stickler for those details, to the point of obsession. His encounter with Homicide Detective Marty Wynn, the technical advisor on “He Walked by Night” is what started him down that road.
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And get this, Sam, it was written by a former LAPD officer!
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