DENVER, Pa. – Dan Morphy, CEO of Morphy Auctions, has announced the appointment of Michael L. Vice as expert consultant in firearms and militaria. In his new position, Vice, who is based in Gettysburg, Pa., will appraise and catalog guns, rifles and military-related artifacts for all Morphy Firearms sales, starting with a January 11 auction that features a major Colt collection.

Michael L. Vice, newly appointed Firearms & Militaria expert at Morphy Auctions

Michael Vice is a Texas native who obtained his B.A. in history from Mississippi State University, and a Master of Arts degree in museum science from Texas Tech University. He undertook further postgraduate studies in military history at Kansas State University and was an honorary research associate at the University of Birmingham’s World I History Centre in Birmingham, England.

Additionally, Vice is a graduate of the Seminar for Historical Administration, a nationally recognized museum management and leadership training course sponsored by AAM, AASLH, The Smithsonian, and The National Trust for Historic Preservation.

In 2009, Vice co-authored a major work about surviving Crimean War British artifacts that are held in UK museums and private collections. Titled “Crimean Memories: Artefacts of the Crimean War,” it won the Independent Publishers Association’s Silver Medal for Best Reference Book for 2010.

Vice is a Vietnam veteran and retired major in the US Army Reserve, and has spent the past 30+ years in the museum field. Most recently, he served as museum curator at the US Army Medical Museum at Ft. Sam Houston, Texas. During the decade between 1993 and 2003, he was chief museum curator at Gettysburg National Military Park, overseeing a world-famous collection of 42,000 historical artifacts, a vast park archive, and a collection of 700,000 archaeological specimens. His distinguished work history also includes curatorial positions with the US Army Corps of Engineers Office of History, the US Army Center of Military History, the National Park Service, and the United States Cavalry Museum.

An active member of many state and national organizations devoted to antique firearms and military history, Vice enjoys collecting, researching, restoring and shooting American military longarms made between 1835 and 1890. He is considered a leading expert on the American Civil War and American Indian Wars (1866-1890).

“We feel extremely honored that Michael agreed to join Morphy’s as head of our Firearms and Militaria department,” said Dan Morphy. “His qualifications are superb, and his expertise and reputation will play a major role in the further development of what has become one of our strongest and most active departments at Morphy’s.”

**To contact Michael Vice regarding consignments to future Firearms sales at Morphy’s, call 717-335-3435 or email info@morphyauctions.com.