1962 is right in the temporal sweet spot of my Mike Montego novels — Shades of Blue, 459-Framed in Red, The Purple Hand, and He Blew Blue Jazz. Here are a few fun facts about this swingin’ year...

1962 Tidbits

Tobacco: Philip Morris introduced “Marlboro Country” to advertise its top filter-tip cigarette against R. J. Reynolds’ Winston brand. The cowboy theme will make Marlboro the leading brand worldwide.

Lt. Co John H. Glenn, Jr., Marine Corps pilot, became the first American in orbit February 20th when he circled Earth three times, covering 81,000 miles at an altitude of 160 miles in the Mercury capsule Friendship 7.

President Kennedy on February 14^th announced that U.S. military advisers in Vietnam would fire back if fired upon.

Supreme Court on March 26^th backed “one-man one-vote” apportionment of seats in state legislatures.

Europe’s Arlberg-Orient Express goes out of service May 27^th after nearly 79 years of operation between Paris and Istanbul; and the Simplon-Orient Express ends service as well. Both have been victims of the airplane that has cut travel time between the cities to two hours.

Economic, Finance, and Retailing: K Mart discount stores are opened by the 63-year-old S.S. Kresge Co., whose five-and-ten-cent stores are losing money. By 1977 Kresge sales will be second only to those of Sears, but Wal-Mart will pass it in the 1980s.

The first Wal-Mart store opens July 2^nd at Rogers, Arkansas. Retail merchant Sam Moore Walton, 44, had run a Ben Franklin store with his brother James at Bentonville; Sam proposed a chain of discount stores in small towns; Ben Franklin dismissed the idea and Walton goes into business for himself. His chain will surpass sales of Sears, Roebuck by 1991.

Food and Drink:  Diet-Rite Cola, introduced by Royal Crown Cola, is the first sugar-free soft drink to be sold nationwide to the general public. The cyclamate-sweetened cola will soon have powerful competitors.

First U.S. communications satellite is launched in July.

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring launches the environmental movement.

James Howard Meredith, 29, an Air Force veteran, became the first black student at University of Mississippi, “Old Miss,” October 1^st after 3,000 troops put down riots. His admission was ordered by a federal appellate court and upheld by the Supreme Court.

President Kennedy revealed A Soviet offensive missile buildup in Cuba October 22nd. He ordered a naval and air quarantine on shipment of offensive military equipment to the island nation. Kennedy and Soviet Premier Khrushchev reached agreement on October 28 on a formula to end the crisis. Kennedy announced November 2^nd that Soviet missile bases in Cuba were being dismantled.

Cigar smokers are the chief U.S. victims of President Kennedy’s embargo on trade with Cuba. U.S. cigar sales exceed six billion per year with 95 percent of Cuban cigars rolled and wrapped in U.S. plants, but without Cuban tobacco cigar sales will fall to 5.3 billion per ear by 1976 despite population growth.

Sports: Ohio golfer Jack William Nicklaus, 22, wins the U.S. Open by defeating Arnold Palmer in a playoff.

Sonny Liston wins the world heavyweight boxing title September 25^th. Now 28, he knocks out Floyd Patterson in the first round of a championship bout at Chicago.

New York Yankees win the World Series by defeating the San Francisco Giants 4 games to 3.

Technology: Electronic Data Systems (EDS) is founded by Dallas salesman H. (Henry) Ross Perot, 32, whose data processing firm will make him a billionaire.

Polaroid Corp. introduces color film invented by Edwin H. Land. The high-speed film produces color prints in 60 seconds (Polaroid’s black-and-white film produces prints in 10 seconds).

Films: Roman Polanski’s Knife in the Water; David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia; Sidney Lumet’s A Long Day’s Journey Into Night; John Ford’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance; Sam Peckinpah’s Ride the High Country; François Truffaut’s Shoot the Piano Player; Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo; Perter Ustinov’s Billy Budd; Hiroshi Imagaki’s Chushingura; George Seaton’s The Counterfeit Traitor; Blake Edwards’ Days of Wine and Roses; Pietro Germi’s Divorce—Italian Style; Luis Buñuels The Exterminating Angel; John Huston’s Freud; Tony Richardson’s The loneliness of the Long Distance Runner; John Frankenheimer’s The Manchurian Candidate; Artgyr Oebb;s The Miracle Worker; Kon Ichikawa’s The Outcast; Richard Brooks’ Sweet Bird of Youth; Robert Mulligan’s To Kill a Mockingbird; Robert Aldrich’s What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?; and, Ingmar Bergman’s Winter Light.

Music — Popular songs: “Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer” by Hoagy Carmichael; “Days of Wine and Roses” by Henry Mancini (title song for film about alcoholism); “Dream Baby” and “Leah” by Roy Orbison; “Ramblin’ Rose by Noel and Joe Sherman; “Roses Are Red, My Love” by Al Byron and Hugh Evans’ “The Wanderer” by Ernest Maresca; “I left My Heart in San Francisco” by George Cory; “The Lonely Bull” by California trumpet player-vocalist-composer Herb Alpert, 27; “Surfin’ Safari” by the Beach Boys Brian Wilson, 20, Dennis Wilson, 17, Mike Love, 21, Al Jardine, 19, and Carl Wilson, 25.

The San Fernando Valley (locally known as “The Valley“) is an urbanized valley located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area of southern California, United States, defined by the mountains of the Transverse Ranges circling it. Home to 1.76 million people, it lies north of the larger and more populous Los Angeles Basin.

Nearly two thirds of the Valley’s land area is part of the city of Los Angeles. The other incorporated cities in the valley are Burbank, Glendale, San Fernando, Hidden Hills and Calabasas.

Geography

The San Fernando Valley is about 260 square miles (670 km) bounded by the Santa Susana Mountains to the northwest, the Simi Hills to the west, the Santa Monica Mountains and Chalk Hills to the south, the Verdugo Mountains to the east, and the San Gabriel Mountains to the northeast. The northern Sierra Pelona Mountains, northwestern Topatopa Mountains, southern Santa Ana Mountains, and Downtown Los Angeles skyscrapers can be seen from higher neighborhoods, passes, and parks in the San Fernando Valley.

The Los Angeles River begins at the confluence of Calabasas Creek (Arroyo Calabasas) and Bell Creek (Escorpión Creek) at Canoga Park High School beside Vanowen Street in Canoga Park. Those creeks’ headwaters are in the Santa Monica Calabasas foothills, the Simi Hills’ Hidden Hills, Santa Susana Field Laboratory, and Santa Susana Pass Park lands. The River flows eastward along the southern regions of the Valley. One of the river’s two unpaved sections can be found at the Sepulveda Basin. A seasonal river, the Tujunga Wash, drains much of the western facing San Gabriel Mountains and passes into and then through the Hansen Dam Recreation Center in Lake View Terrace. It flows south along the Verdugo Mountains through the eastern communities of the Valley to join the Los Angeles River in Studio City. Other notable tributaries of the River include Dayton Creek, Caballero Creek, Bull Creek, Pacoima Wash, and Verdugo Wash. The elevation of the floor of the valley varies from about 600 ft (180 m) to 1,200 ft (370 m) above sea level.

Most of the San Fernando Valley is within the jurisdiction of the city of Los Angeles, although a few other incorporated cities are located within the Valley as well: Burbank and Glendale are in the southeast corner of the Valley, Hidden Hills and Calabasas are in the southwest corner, and San Fernando, which is completely surrounded by Los Angeles, is in the northeast valley. Universal City, an enclave in the southern part of the Valley, is unincorporated land housing the Universal Studios filming lot. Mulholland Drive, which runs along the ridgeline of the Santa Monica Mountains, marks the boundary between the Valley and the communities of Hollywood and the Los Angeles Westside.

Services

• The Los Angeles satellite administrative center for the valley, The Civic Center Van Nuys, is in Van Nuys. The area in and around the Van Nuys branch of Los Angeles City Hall is home to a police station, municipal and superior courts and Los Angeles city and county administrative offices. Northridge is home to California State University, Northridge (originally named San Fernando Valley State College).
• Many branches of the Los Angeles Public Library are located in the Valley.
• For independent libraries see “Incorporated Cities (independent)” in the “Municipalities and districts” list below.
• Los Angeles Police Department, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, and independent valley city departments.
• Los Angeles Fire Department, Los Angeles County Fire Department, Burbank Police Department, and independent valley city departments.
• City of Los Angeles Neighborhood Councils.

History Pre-statehood

The Tongva, later known as the Gabrieleño Mission Indians after colonization, and the Tataviam to the north and Chumash to the west, had lived and thrived in the Valley and its arroyos for over 8,000 years. They had numerous settlements, and trading and hunting camps, before the Spanish arrived in 1769 to settle in the Valley.

The first Spanish land grant in the San Fernando Valley (or El Valle de Santa Catalina de Bononia de los Encinos was called ‘Rancho Encino’ (present day Mission Hills on the Camino Viejo before Newhall Pass), in the northern part of the San Fernando Valley. Juan Francisco Reyes built an adobe dwelling beside a Tongva village or rancheria at natural springs, but the land was soon taken from him so a Mission could be built there. Mission San Fernando Rey de España was established in 1797 as the 17th of the twenty-one missions.[6] The land trade granted Juan Francisco Reyes the similarly named Rancho Los Encinos, also beside springs (Los Encinos State Historic Park in present day Encino). Later the Mexican land grants of Rancho El Escorpión (West Hills), Rancho Providencia and Rancho Cahuenga (Burbank), and Rancho Ex-Mission San Fernando (rest of valley) covered the San Fernando Valley.

The Treaty of Cahuenga, ending the Mexican-American War fighting in Alta California, was signed in 1847 by Californios and Americans at Campo de Cahuenga, the Verdugo Family adobe at the entrance to the Cahuenga Pass in the southeast San Fernando Valley (North Hollywood). The 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the entire war.

Statehood and beyond

The valley’s climate is not as some describe, a desert, and originally was naturally a “temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrub lands biome” of grassland, oak savanna, and chaparral shrub forest types of plant community habitats, along with lush riparian plants along the river, creeks, and springs. In this Mediterranean climate, post-1790s European agriculture for the mission’s support consisted of grapes, figs, olives, and general garden crops.[7] In 1874 dry wheat farming was introduced by J. B. Lankershim and Isaac Van Nuys and became very productive for their San Fernando Homestead Association that owned the southern half of the Valley. In 1876 they sent the very first wheat shipment from both San Pedro Harbor and from the United States to Europe.

20th century

Aqueduct

Through late 19th century court decisions, Los Angeles had won the rights to all surface flow water atop an aquifer groundwater beneath the Valley, without it being within the city limits. San Fernando Valley farmers offered to buy the surplus aqueduct water, but the federal legislation that enabled the construction of the aqueduct prohibited Los Angeles from selling the water outside of the city limits. This induced several independent towns surrounding Los Angeles to vote on and approve annexation to the city so they could connect to the municipal water system. These rural areas became part of Los Angeles in 1915. Concurrently and perhaps pre-aware, the Los Angeles Suburban Homes Company, a syndicate led by Harry Chandler, Hobart Johnstone Whitley, president of the company, James B. Lankershim, and Isaac Van Nuys, extended the Pacific Electric Railway (Red Cars) through the Valley to Owensmouth (now Canoga Park and West Hills) and laid out plans for roads and the towns of Lankershim (now Toluca Lake), Van Nuys, Marian (now Reseda) and Owensmouth. The rural areas became annexed by Los Angeles in 1915. The growing towns voted for annexation – for example: Owensmouth (Canoga Park) in 1917, Laurel Canyon and Lankershim in 1923, Sunland in 1926, La Tuna Canyon in 1926, and the incorporated city of Tujunga in 1932 – more than doubling the size of the city. A fictionalized story based on these events is told in the 1974 film Chinatown.

The Aqueduct water shifted farming from wheat to irrigated crops such as corn, beans, squash, and cotton; orchards of apricots, persimmons, and walnuts; and major citrus groves of oranges and lemons. They continued until the next increment of development converted land use, with post-war suburbanization leaving only a few enclaves, such as the ‘open air museum’ groves at the Orcutt Ranch Park and CSUN campus.

Developments

Also the advent of three new industries in the early 20th century – motion pictures, automobiles, and aircraft – spurred urbanization and population growth. World War II production and the subsequent postwar boom accelerated this growth so that by 1960, the valley had a population of well over one million. Los Angeles continued to consolidate its territories in the San Fernando Valley by annexing the former Rancho El Escorpión for Canoga Park-West Hills in 1959, and the huge historic “Porter Ranch” at the foot of the Santa Susana Mountains for the new planned developments in Porter Ranch in 1965. The additions expanded the Los Angeles portion of San Fernando Valley from the original 169 square miles (438 km) to 224 square miles (580 km) today.

Six Valley cities incorporated independently from Los Angeles: Glendale in 1906, Burbank and San Fernando in 1911, Hidden Hills in 1961, and Calabasas in 1991. Universal City is an unincorporated enclave that is home to Universal Studios theme park and Universal CityWalk. Other unincorporated areas in the Valley are Bell Canyon.

Northridge earthquake

The 1994 Northridge earthquake, struck on January 17 and measured 6.7 on the Richter Scale and produced the largest ground motions ever recorded in an urban environment and caused the greatest damage in the United States since the 1906 San Francisco. Its epicenter was located between Arminta St. and Ingomar St. just east of Reseda Blvd. under the community of Reseda. The death toll was 57, and more than 1,500 people were seriously injured. A few days after the earthquake, 9,000 homes and businesses were still without electricity; 20,000 were without gas; and more than 48,500 had little or no water. About 12,500 structures were moderately to severely damaged, which left thousands of people temporarily homeless. Of the 66,546 buildings inspected, 6% were severely damaged (red tagged) and 17% were moderately damaged (yellow tagged). In addition, damage to several major freeways serving Los Angeles choked the traffic system in the days following the earthquake. Major freeway damage occurred as far away as 25 miles (40 km) from the epicenter. Collapses and other severe damage forced closure of portions of 11 major roads to downtown Los Angeles.

This was the second time in 23 years that the San Fernando Valley had been affected by a strong earthquake. On February 9, 1971, a magnitude 6.6 event struck about 20 miles (32 km) northeast of the epicenter of the 1994 event. The 1971 earthquake caused 58 fatalities and about 2,000 injuries. At the time, the 1971 earthquake had been the most destructive event to affect greater Los Angeles since the magnitude 6.3 Long Beach earthquake of 1933.

Parks and recreation

The San Fernando Valley is home to numerous neighborhood ‘pocket parks,’ city parks, Recreation areas, and large Regional Open Space preserves. Many preserves are maintained as public parkland by the National Park Service’s Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, the California State Parks, and local county and municipal parks districts.

Small garden parks and missions

• CSUN Botanic Garden
• The Japanese Garden
• The gardens at Adobes
• The Orcutt Ranch Horticulture Center
• The Leonis Adobe
• The Andrés Pico adobe
• Los Encinos State Historic Park
• Mission San Fernando

Recreation areas

• Griffith Park, located at the southeastern end of the valley in the Hollywood Hills.
• Sepulveda Dam recreation area
• Hansen Dam recreation area
• Los Angeles River, there are parks of various sizes along the part of the river located in the Valley

Mountain open-space parks

• O’Melveny Park above Granada Hills
• Rocky Peak Park
• Santa Susana Pass State Historic Park
• Chatsworth Park South
• Sage Ranch Park
• Bell Canyon Park
• El Escorpión Park
• Upper Las Virgenes Canyon Open Space Preserve
• Deukmejian Wilderness Park
• La Tuna Park
• Brand Park
• Verdugo Mountains Open Space Preserve
• Marvin Braude Mulholland Gateway Park
• Wilacre Park
• Laurel Canyon Park
• Topanga State Park
• Backbone Trail System
• Juan Bautista de Anza National Historic Trail

Economy

The Valley is home to numerous companies, the most well known of which work in motion pictures, music recording, and television production. The former movie ranches were branches of original studios now consisting of CBS Studio Center, NBCUniversal, The Walt Disney Company (and its ABC television network), and Warner Bros.

The Valley was previously known for advances in aerospace technology and nuclear research by companies such as Lockheed, Rocketdyne and its Santa Susana Field Laboratory, Atomics International, Litton Industries, Marquardt, and TRW’s predecessor Thompson Ramo Wooldridge.

Adult entertainment

The Valley became the pioneering region for producing adult films in the 1970s and since then has been home to a multi-billion dollar pornography industry, earning the monikers “Porn Valley” and “San Pornando Valley”. The leading trade paper for the industry, AVN Magazine, is based in the Northwest Valley, as are a majority of the nation’s adult video and magazine distributors. According to the HBO series Pornucopia, nearly 90% of all legally distributed pornographic films made in the United States are either filmed in or produced by studios based in the San Fernando Valley.

Rail and air

Metrolink commuter rail has two Valley lines, the Antelope Valley Line and Ventura County Line, connect the Valley and beyond to downtown Los Angeles and south, becoming one line at the Burbank station.

Amtrak‘s Pacific Surfliner long distance rail line has stops at Glendale, Burbank Airport station, Van Nuys, and Chatsworth station, before proceeding on to Ventura County, Santa Barbara, and Northern California or Union Station and San Diego.

The California High-Speed Rail Authority is planning two stations in the Valley, one in downtown Burbank and the other in Sylmar with an initial section of the railroad possibly opening in 2020.

The Valley’s two major airports are Bob Hope Airport and the Van Nuys Airport. The Van Nuys – Airport FlyAway Terminal provides non-stop scheduled shuttle service to LAX and back to the Valley, with parking.

Valley independence and secession

Many neighborhoods of Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley have ‘seceded’ from one another in the form of renaming and reforming known community boundaries. Groups are motivated by the desire to disassociate themselves from undesirable connotations that some communities have inherited and, in the process, increase property values. Lake Balboa broke away from Van Nuys. Valley Village separated from North Hollywood. Valley Glen included portions of both Van Nuys and North Hollywood. West Hills and Winnetka separated from Canoga Park. Porter Ranch seceded from Northridge. Arleta broke off from Pacoima but failed to establish its own ZIP code. The new separatist districts are so in name only; none of them gained any governmental authority, and they remain districts within the City of Los Angeles, merely with new names.

Demographics

According to the 2010 San Fernando Valley U.S. Census report, the population of the San Fernando Valley is 1.77 million. Of the population 41.1% were non-Hispanic white, 42.0% were Hispanic or Latino, 3.8% were African Americans and 10.7% were Asian. The largest cities located entirely in the valley are Glendale and Burbank. The most populous districts of Los Angeles in the valley are North Hollywood and Van Nuys. Each of the two cities and the two districts named has more than 100,000 residents. Despite the San Fernando Valley’s reputation for sprawling, low-density development, the valley communities of Panorama City, North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Reseda, Canoga Park, and Northridge, all in Los Angeles, have numerous apartment complexes and contain some of the densest census tracts in Los Angeles.

Latinos and non-Hispanic whites are nearly even in numbers. In general, communities in the northeastern and central parts of the Valley have the highest concentration of Latinos. Non-Hispanic Whites live mainly in the communities along the region’s mountain rim and in the northwestern, western, southwestern, southern, and southeastern sections of the valley, including the Shadow Hills neighborhood.

Asian Americans make up 10% of the population and live throughout the valley, but are most numerous in the city of Glendale and the Los Angeles communities of Chatsworth, Panorama City, Northridge, Porter Ranch and Granada Hills. Another large ethnic element of the populace is the Iranian community with 200,000 people living mainly in west San Fernando Valley such as Tarzana, Calabasas, Woodland Hills, Encino, & Sherman Oaks. The valley is also home to a large Jewish community, with a large part of its population in the North Hollywood and Valley Village areas. The city of Glendale has a large Armenian community. African Americans compose 3.8% of the Valley’s population, living mainly in the Los Angeles sections of Lake View Terrace, Pacoima, Reseda, Valley Village, Van Nuys, and Northridge.

Poverty rates in the San Fernando Valley are lower than the rest of the county (15.3% compared to 17.9%). Nevertheless, in eight San Fernando Valley communities, at least one in five residents lives in poverty.

The Pacoima district of Los Angeles is widely known in the region as a hub of suburban blight. Other San Fernando Valley communities, such as the Los Angeles sections of Mission Hills, Arleta, and Northridge, have poverty rates well below the regional average.

Many wealthy families live in the hills south of Ventura Boulevard.

(The following was excerpted from the Los Angeles Times, December 23, 2012, by Kate Linthicum. The original articles is titled, “L.A. City Hall is one of painter’s masterpieces”)

Joe Nicoletti started out painting houses in New Jersey. These days, he paints Los Angeles City Hall.

Since a major renovation of the historic building began nearly 20 years ago, Nicoletti has been the city’s go-to guy when a skilled hand is needed to restore a frieze or touch up a mural.

His most recent assignment — repainting the elaborately decorated ceiling of the Main Street lobby — took the 50-year-old Santa Monica resident two weeks and eight assistants to complete. His crew toiled at night, the better to stay out of the way of city bureaucrats, and Nicoletti livened the workspace with the sounds of Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra and the like. Around midnight, they would break for “lunch,” usually takeout from downtown eateries such as Pete’s Cafe or Cole’s French Dip.

The last night of the job, Nicoletti and some members of his crew were finishing up a few final details. Some cracked plaster needed repairing, and a small section of gold didn’t look quite rich enough. Nicoletti had brought several sheets of gold leaf that he hoped would do the trick.

“It’s $1,700 an ounce,” he said, waving the sheets like little flags. The gold is also edible, he added. “You can sprinkle it on some soufflé.”

He was standing atop precarious-looking scaffolding. An assistant, Luke Adkins, steadied the apparatus down below as Nicoletti excitedly pointed out noteworthy patterns in the ceiling’s design. “This is a medallion, that’s a ziggurat, and I think this is a cartouche,” he said.

Then he dabbed some glue, pressed the gold leaf into place and gently peeled off the backing, as if applying a temporary tattoo.

“That is sweet,” Adkins called up. “That is very nice. Man, you nailed it.”

Nicoletti smiled.

His company, Chameleon Paintworks, has done custom jobs at downtown’s Millennium Biltmore Hotel, an 89-year-old historic landmark, and for celebrity clients including Quentin Tarantino and Sting.

But there’s something special about City Hall, he said. Over the years he has painted its hallways, ceilings and even the City Council chambers. He plans to bid on future contracts for restoration work in the building’s rotunda and other areas.

“I’m really proud of this building,” he said. “I like it a lot.”

With the latest Bond flick now in the cinemas, it’s interesting to take a look at 007’s handgun of choice.

The Walther PP series pistols are blowback-operated semi-automatics. They feature an exposed hammer, a traditional double-action trigger mechanism, a single-column magazine, and a fixed barrel that also acts as the guide rod for the recoil spring. The series includes the Walther PP, PPK, PPK/S, and PPK/E. The various PP series are manufactured in either Germany or the United States. Since 2002, the PPK variant is solely manufactured by Smith & Wesson in Houlton, Maine, under license from Carl Walther GmbH Sportwaffen. In the past, this particular model was manufactured by Carl Walther in its own factory in Germany, as well as under license by Manurhin in Alsace, France, and by Interarms in Alexandria, Virginia.

Originally built in 1929, the Walther PPK remains a popular pistol, used today for concealed carry, V.I.P. protection, and Britain’s MI5, as well as by European and American police. It has also been a popular display pistol to give as a gift to American and British military officers.

The PP was first released in 1929, and the PPK in 1931; both were popular with European police and civilians, for being reliable and concealable. During World War II, they were issued to the German military and police, the Schutzstaffel, the Luftwaffe, and Nazi Party officials; Adolf Hitler shot and killed himself with his PPK (a 7.65mm/.32 ACP) in the Führerbunker in Berlin. More importantly(!), the Walther PPK (also a 7.65mm/.32 ACP) pistol is famous as James Bond’s signature gun in many of the Bond films, (including the latest, Skyfall), and novels. Ian Fleming’s choice of the Walther PPK directly influenced its popularity and its notoriety.

The most common variant is the Walther PPK, the Polizeipistole Kurz (Police Pistol Short), indicating it was more concealable than the original PP, and hence better suited for plainclothes and undercover work. Sometimes, the name Polizeipistole Kurz (Short Police Pistol) is used; however, the accuracy of that interpretation is unclear. The PPK is a smaller version of the PP (Polizeipistole) with a shorter grip and barrel and reduced magazine capacity.

The PP and the PPK were among the world’s first successful double action semi-automatic pistols that were widely copied, but still made by Walther. The design inspired other pistols, among them the Soviet Makarov, the Hungarian FEG PA-63, the Argentinian Bersa Thunder 380, the Spanish Astra Constable, and the Czech CZ50. Although it was an excellent semi-automatic pistol, it had competitors in its time.

Walther’s original factory was located in Zella-Mehlis in the state  of Thuringia. As that part of Germany was occupied by the Soviet Union following World War II, Walther was forced to flee to West Germany, where they established a new factory in Ulm. However, for several years following the war, the Allied powers forbade any manufacture of weapons in Germany. As a result, in 1952, Walther licensed production of the PP series pistols to a French company, Manufacture de Machines du Haut-Rhin, also known as Manurhin. The French company continued to manufacture the PP series until 1986. In fact, Manurhin manufactured all postwar European-made PP series pistols manufactured until 1986, even though the pistol slide may bear the markings of the Walther factory in Ulm.

In 1978, Ranger Manufacturing of Gadsden, Alabama was licensed to manufacture the PPK and PPK/S; this version was distributed by Interarms of Alexandria, Virginia. This license was eventually canceled. Starting in 2002, Smith & Wesson (S&W) began manufacturing the PPK and PPK/S under license.
Walther has indicated that, with the exception of the PP and the new PPK/E model, S&W is the current sole source for new PPK-type pistols.

The PPK/S was developed following the enactment of the Gun Control Act of 1968 (GCA68) in the United States, the pistol’s largest market. One of the provisions of GCA68 banned the importation of pistols and revolvers not meeting certain requirements of length, weight, and other “sporting” features into the U.S. The PPK failed the “Import Points” test of the GCA68 by a single point. Walther addressed this situation by combining the PP’s frame with the PPK’s barrel and slide to create a pistol that weighed slightly more than the PPK. The additional ounce or two of weight of the PPK/S compared to the PPK was sufficient to provide the extra needed import points.

Because U.S. law allowed domestic production (as opposed to importation) of the PPK, manufacture began under license in the U.S. in 1978; Interarms distributed this model. The version currently manufactured by Smith & Wesson has been modified by incorporating a longer grip tang, better protecting the shooter from slide bite, i.e. the rearward-traveling slide’s pinching the web between the index finger and thumb of the firing hand, which was a problem with the original design.

In the 1950s, Walther produced the PPK-L, a lightweight variant of the PPK. The PPK-L differed from the standard, all steel PPK in that it had an aluminium alloy frame. These were only chambered in 7.65mm Browning (.32 ACP) and .22 LR because of the increase in felt recoil from the lighter weight of the gun. All other features of the postwar production PPK/S (brown plastic grips with Walther banner, high polished blue finish, lanyard loop, loaded chamber indicator, 7+1 magazine capacity and overall length) were the same on the PPK-L.

In the 1960s, Walther began stamping “Made in West Germany” on the frame of the pistol right below the magazine release button. The 1950s production pistols had the date of manufacture, designated as ‘month/year’, stamped on the right side of the slide. Starting in the 1960s, the production date, designated by the last two digits of the year, was stamped on the exposed part of the barrel that could be seen in the ejection port.