By Bob Lesmeister

Attendees at the 2010 Shooting, Hunting and Outdoor Trade (SHOT) Show in Las Vegas in January will be able to ogle the new "breed" of Coonan pistols.

"We're hoping to please everybody," quips Dan Coonan, who has spent a lifetime in the gun industry, and is now re-launching a new firm with updated handguns based on his original breakthrough .357 Magnum semi-auto pistol concept. Coonan will also be showing a variety of other products.

"At the SHOT Show, we'll have a .357 Magnum in standard configuration and then one with sight options. We'll also bring our compact gun with options as well. In addition, we'll have our .38 Special conversion kits there. I will definitely bring one of my FAL receivers, too." Perhaps added to the lot, Coonan is also thinking about manufacturing .45 parts as well.

The new Coonan pistols will be manufactured of 17-4PH stainless steel, an alloy that uses about 17% chromium and 4% nickel.

The current Coonan company, Coonan Inc. (2033 105th Ave. NE, Dept. WG, Blaine, MN 55449; phone: 763-786-1720; online: www.coonaninc.com) is not a continuation of what was the original Coonan Arms. In 1985, Coonan sold Coonan Arms to Bill Davis and five years later he left the company.

In 1994, Coonan Arms filed Chapter 11 and eventually was incorporated by JS Worldwide Distribution. In 1998, both Coonan Arms and JS Worldwide were dissolved by the state of Minnesota. All the while Coonan was busy.

"After I left Coonan, I did a lot of custom gunsmithing, mainly pistolsmithing. And eventually I worked myself into making parts. I was producing a lot of parts for other firearms manufacturers and that progressed into more and more parts."

Some parts, Coonan didn't have to make as he got his hands on some original Coonan parts. "

Coonan's original .357 Magnum pistol has a long and unusual history. It may be the only handgun ever developed while its designer was in college and, strangely, it earned him graduate credits.

He developed the prototype magazine and prototype pistol while in college and received three graduate credits for the magazine and three graduate credits for the pistol. The course was a graduate manufacturing technology course.

Imagine trying to do that nowadays when you can get thrown off campus for wearing a T-shirt with a facsimile of a gun printed on it-or a gun-related slogan.

The SHOT Show may also be the debut of Coonan's "gun of the fuchsia"! No, no, don't shoot the messenger; this isn't just a variation on the currently popular "pink" theme in guns and outdoor products. Dan Coonan explains what it's all about.

"I made a special gun for my girls. When I was doing all custom .45, 9mm and .38 Super work, I wound up with an aluminum frame and I thought I'm going to get a Ciener conversion unit and make a little .22 out of it for my girls. I brought home samples of the various colors I could anodize the frame. I had over 30 sample plates that I fanned out so they could pick whatever they wanted.

"All three at once pointed to the purple one and shouted, "Fuchsia!" I had no idea what fuchsia was. We now call that pistol the "gun of the fuchsia."