[G.T.]

Hi Albert, I can't answer why, but I do have an idea as to why not... I have always had a particular interest in pig skin holsters and have a pretty good selection of WW2 pig holsters, with DLU being my favorite. It seems as if there are quite a few nice surviving examples still around... Anyway, as my interest is in this area, I started researching pigskin and found out that until recently it was extremely hard to mass produce pigskin hides from processing plants... I can't remember if it was due to the fragile nature of the raw hide, or problems encountered with the tanning process, but for whatever reason, it was not cost effective, or comparable quality, when compared to cowhide... So basically they just threw it away... Unless they were in drastically short supply of strategic materials, and then the amount of work needed to process became moot... They used whatever they could get their hands on!.. Most pigskin hides processed now are chrome tanned and used in the garment industry. Veg tanned hides of the correct thickness and weight are hard to find, and are mostly used in the crafts and hobbies area, as well as in saddle making.. But usually it is too thin and not suitable for holsters. I think once the pigskin leather is tanned, and is the correct weight, it didn't matter at all to the holster manufacture. It was just leather, just a bit different in strength and thickness. Although I'd like to believe they made efforts to use cowhide for straps and loops, I have seen pigskin used indiscriminately in these areas also... So again, it was just another source of usuable leather... hope this helps... Best to all, til.....lat'r.....GT