For sale: Pearl-handled police revolver, notebook with bullet hole, Oakland County history
A pearl-handled .38 Special inscribed to Frank Schram, an Oakland County sheriff during Prohibition, is up for auction this weekend.
But unless you are a collector — or maybe a Michigan museum intent on acquiring some law enforcement history — the nickel-finished gun, and other items that the seller says belonged to the lawman, might not be as interesting as the stories behind them.
And the Rock Island Auction Co. is happy to tell the tale.
"We all like a good shootout story, right?" the auction house's YouTube video on the gun and sheriff begins. "The TV and movies are full of them, and some of the real-life counterparts have permanently etched their place in history."
In the account promoting the auction, there's not just one, but two shootouts.
The bidding, which starts 10 a.m. EST Friday, will allow potential buyers to submit offers online, by phone, and in-person in Rock Island, Illinois, where the auction house is based.
The auction items belonging to Schram, the auction house says, include handcuffs, two gold-plated badges, a 1928 annual report, and a black bullet-damaged detective's notebook that supposedly saved his life in a gunfight.
The lot, No. 504, is valued at up to $75,000.
Ready for the story behind it?
Here's how Joel Kolander, the auction company's interactive production manager, tells it.
In 1924, Oakland County elected Schram the sheriff. He had been the county's undersheriff for three years, and the video concludes, "he must have done a pretty good job since they made him sheriff, and kept him there."
The first shootout was in May 1921.
Schram and two other lawmen responded to a call from Highland Township. Four young men had apparently abandoned their car and folks thought they looked suspicious. The cops drove up and, according to a Free Press report "demanded their business."
And this is where the story gets dicey.
The men didn't just look suspicious. They were wanted in connection to a Livingston County robbery and had no intention of surrendering. Their response? Two drew weapons and started firing.
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One deputy was shot in the arm, and Schram was hit in the chest.
The three deputies returned fire, killing one of the robbers and injuring another.
The bullet that hit Schram?
It turns out, it was stopped by the notebook that's up for auction. The notebook includes notes on policing and patrolling activities from 1921 and appears to that a .32- or .38-caliber size bullet hole in it.
The account is backed up by a May 27, 1921, Free Press report with a Pontiac dateline. It ran on the front page with the headline "1 DEAD, 3 SHOT IN GUN BATTLE." The deck head adds: "Pointiac Officers Wounded by First Volley but Round Up Detroit Gang."
The paper cost just 3 cents, and the report confirms the detail about the notebook, in which a bullet was embedded.
The second shootout occurred a few months later. It didn't involve Schram, but a story with two shootouts certainly tops a story with just one. It heightens the tension and adds some context.
Fast forward almost a decade. Schram retires as sheriff in the 1930s. As what is believed to be a parting gift, he is presented with the revolver that is up for auction. It has his name engraved on it, and comes with the original box.
The auction catalog describes the gun, serial No. 398804, as a "historic documented factory engraved Colt first issue Detective special double-action revolver" with a two-inch barrel.
But Schram didn't ride off into the sunset.
The last part of the story goes, the heroic ex-sheriff comes out of retirement to go after armed bank robbers who had killed the new undersheriff and a deputy, maybe even using that fancy gun bearing his name.
Rock Island Auction is selling the gun from the Doug Ellison collection. Ellison, who died earlier this year, was an active firearms collector. The auction house doesn't know how Ellison acquired the collection.
It's up to you to decide how much of the account is true and how much is apocryphal. But for those looking for some suburban Detroit history and lore to recount at their upcoming holiday gathering, that's the story.
Contact Frank Witsil: 313-222-5022 or fwitsil@freepress.com.
To submit a bid
The Rock Island Auction Co. has an online instruction video about how to bid at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zdjdp7Zms_o. The link to register is: www.rockislandauction.com/live/ and the phone number is 309-797-1500.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Prohibition-era police artifacts from Oakland County up for auction
