Date of manufacture for a Model 39

The only sure way to determine a manufacture date on S&Ws is to pay for a letter from the factory. However, the Standard Catalog of Smith and Wesson shows shipping date for Model 39 serial numbers between A565001-A655000 as 1978-1979. A decent guess would be early to mid 1979.

My STANDARD CATALOG OF SMITH & WESSON, is the 4th edition, from 11/2016, and indicates the same serial number range as Post #2, but has the years 1979-1980.

L-2 is correct. I misread the number range the first time I looked.