[2] The pistol's reputation and looks have made it popular in cinema and novels and several versions are listed as "Curios and Relics" by the ATF.

The short-recoil operated Auto Mag pistol featured a rotary bolt with six locking lugs located at the front similar to the M16/AR-15 rifle.

[3] In 1970, Auto Mag Corporation president Harry Sanford opened a factory in Pasadena, California.

The design team, headed by Mark Lovendale, took the AutoMag pistol from an unreliable experimental machined chrome-moly steel prototype designed by Harry Sanford and Max Gera[8] and created a more production oriented and marginally reliable stainless steel version.

The Lovendale design team was convinced the Auto Mag pistol was not ready for production and needed more changes to improve reliability and could not be produced at a profit.

Unfortunately the expensive manufacturing processes and materials, function unreliability and need for many parts to be produced by sub-contractors made the gun unprofitable resulting in bankruptcy of the original company.

[9] In August 2015 Walter Sanford sold all the assets of the company including the name, trademark, and all rights to AutoMag Ltd. Corp., a South Carolina-based corporation.

[2] There were barrels made to shoot other cartridges: Kincel was an editor for Gun World magazine and Maynard was a technician who worked at AMT's service department.