Tag Archives: beretta 1951

That time Beretta let me hang out there for a couple days in Italy…

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To say that Beretta has been around for a while is a massive understatement. To the point, the company is the oldest firearms maker in business today, logging its first documented contract in 1526, for arquebus barrels bound for the Republic of Venice from the shop of Bartolomeo Beretta. Who else can say they made arquebus barrels in the old Venetian Republic?

Beretta has well-guarded records going back centuries. This is because the company has been a constant in the region, no matter what banner flew over the land.

Not a lot of companies can say they were founded in the Renaissance. Keep in mind it predates the colonies at St. Augustine, Roanoke, Jamestown, and Plymouth. Further, while other long-running gun makers such as Remington and Smith & Wesson have changed ownership dozens of times over the past couple of centuries, Beretta remains a family business, now in its 15th generation – with the 16th lined up.

Beretta’s campus is located along the Garda Mountains in the foothills of the Alps, with portions of the facility inside the rock itself. (Photos: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

They have been in the same location for a bit.

We had a chance to visit Beretta for a few days earlier this year and have the full factory tour up at Guns.com.

The Beretta M1951

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From time to time in your gun buying travels, it’s likely that you’ll come across a pistol that looks like an old Beretta 92 (or M9 depending on if you have served with Uncle Sam) but on further inspection is nothing of the sort.  A single-stack magazine pistol with a funny release and oddball markings, this gun still bears an uncanny resemblance to the more common double-stack 92 of today.  So what’s the story? Well my boy, meet the Beretta M51, its clones, and its offspring.

Developed in the late 1940s by the Italian military to replace the old .32 and .380 caliber Beretta pistols used during World War 2, the Modello 1951 was the company’s most successful handgun until the 1970s. It brought a number of improvements to the table and evolved during its design phase from a typically understated European pistol to one whose features stand side by side with the best combat pistols of today.

Read the rest in my column at GUNs.com

m1951 diagram