The good old gun days

[fiveoboy01]

What did you do with guns way back when that would get you jailed or yelled at today?

This isn't meant to be a political nor gun control thread, just want to hear some stories. 

-My mom bought my first gun, an Marlin .22 bolt action rifle, from Ace Hardware.  I was a sophomore in HS...   Myself and a classmate plinked at empty Tide detergent containers in a field adjacent to a middle school.  

-I used to walk the ditch by my parent's house looking for crows in the fields to shoot.  Right along a rural highway with a scoped rifle.

-When I was a junior in HS, same classmate as above brought his 870 slug gun into English class for a speech, disassembled it, reassembled it, changed barrels etc...

 

[tadbart]

I vaguely remember gun racks in the back windows of pickup trucks, with actual rifles in them.

Got into firearms pretty late, at around age 30. Clinton's ban was the first piece of anti-gun legislation I remember. 

[Historian]

Gun shops had a smell. It was a mix of gun oil, burnt powder, and bull carp from lots of people's stories. 

I'm gettin older and fewer stores have that smell. 

The last one I went into could be described as the Wet Seal of the gun world. I'm just not cool enough for that kind of store. 

Give me the gun shop of 40 years ago.

[Eric]

I was on a rifle team in high school. We had a 50’ firing range right in the main school building, next to my JROTC classroom. We used to practice regularly after school and were allowed to come in and shoot before school and at lunch, with very little supervision. This was in the mid-eighties. 

[Kapuna]

In my sophomore year of high school, I traded a homemade crossbow for a Titan .22 pistol that had missing grips... I carried that pistol in a cigar box back and forth to school (on the school bus) in order to make new grips in wood shop.... the shop teacher knew what my project was, but didn’t mind as we all had a code of ethics we lived by... my Mom found out about the pistol later on, after it was finished, and gave me $20 for it... Mostly, she didn’t want her 16 year old running around with a .22 pistol.... she gave it back to me years later and it resides in my gun safe... makes for a good story for my sons, but the pistol never shot for #%&@... ☹️

[holyjohnson]

52 minutes ago, Historian said:

Gun shops had a smell. It was a mix of gun oil, burnt powder, and bull carp from lots of people's stories. 

I'm gettin older and fewer stores have that smell. 

The last one I went into could be described as the Wet Seal of the gun world. I'm just not cool enough for that kind of store. 

Give me the gun shop of 40 years ago.

i remember a gun store on the NH border that had the best smell of cedar and Hoppes No.9 they had about 20 M1 Garands lined up.

i miss that smell.

[Silentpoet]

We used to circle the ponds on the grandparent's farm and shoot frogs and turtles.

[Moshe]

8 hours ago, Eric said:

I was on a rifle team in high school. We had a 50’ firing range right in the main school building, next to my JROTC classroom. We used to practice regularly after school and were allowed to come in and shoot before school and at lunch, with very little supervision. This was in the mid-eighties. 

My son is supposed to do that the with M1 Garand with his Alpha Squad this semester in JROTC.  I am still not sure why they are using those and not an AR.

[gwalchmai]

I remember the local National Guard unit coming to our HS on Career Day. They brought an M-16, M-3 grease gun, 1911, and an M-79 grenade launcher. They demonstrated how they worked and field stripped and reassembled them. Then they passed them around the class and let all us boys handle and dry-fire them.

[Historian]

8 hours ago, holyjohnson said:

i remember a gun store on the NH border that had the best smell of cedar and Hoppes No.9 they had about 20 M1 Garands lined up.

i miss that smell.

Yeah I remember rows of 98k mauser and m1s.  Everything is AR related today. Like those odd plastic pistols. 

Strangely I had a chance to talk to a Catholic priest last night who is a serious shooter. Hes hoping to take his m1 to the Camp Perry match. But I digress.

Anyway. I remember when westerns were less morally ambiguous and the bad guy never won.

We kids used to want to be The Rifleman and everyone was fine with that. We carried bb guns around and no one thought twice. Of course we didn't lock our doors much either.

 

[deputy tom]

After school we'd stuff our pockets with ammo and grab the shotgun or .22 rifle and walk down the hollow to hunt or target shoot. Today the swat team would be summoned. tom.

[Huaco Kid]

A bunch of us would head a couple hills over to where there were long-abandoned chicken coops.  Each was 1/4 mile long and all were full of crap, poo, turds, dead things, crap, rusted jagged metal, crap, and crap.  And ten million rats.

Then walk up to "the flats" and  carry our rifles right into the Busy Bee and buy as much .22 as we could hold / afford.

Then maybe head to the gully where generations of farmers had dumped their garbage.  More rats.  Know those colored-glass medicine bottles that people collect and the antique stores sell?  Pow.  Pow.  Pow.  Pow.

[Huaco Kid]

In junior high,  we once had an assignment to make a "Demonstration Presentation".  One kid decided to show how to operate and maintain a shotgun.  He brought it on the bus,  stored it in his locker and carried it to the appropriate class.  He showed how to load (live shells), aim, fire (no, he didn't go that far) and how to clean it.

We had a shooting team.  The kids were allowed to bring the .22's home on the bus for weekend practice.

[janice6]

14 hours ago, Historian said:

Gun shops had a smell. It was a mix of gun oil, burnt powder, and bull carp from lots of people's stories. 

I'm gettin older and fewer stores have that smell. 

The last one I went into could be described as the Wet Seal of the gun world. I'm just not cool enough for that kind of store. 

Give me the gun shop of 40 years ago.

Back in the late 40's  and early 50's I would go to the specialty shops in town and watch them work on products or customer stuff.  One smell that has the most memories, was a Tack Shop in town.  The only one left in our town.  I guess it was because a town of 30,000 was more metropolitan than rural. 

I would go in there and sit for hours watching the guy make Saddles, Bullwhips, assorted tack for working and riding animals.  I loved the smell of the leather shop.  He would do his work and tell me what and how he was doing, while he did it.  I learned a new respect for the craftsmanship involved.

In my town, the gun shops were part of the hardware store or even department stores.  The standalone gun shops were quite small and from what I saw had little social interaction. 

Guns were an everyday item for everyone.  When I was around 9 or 10 all my friends had .22's also.  On Saturday we would all walk to each others house to collect together, while heading to the city limits to go target shooting.  It usually involved up to 6 little kids with rifles and typically 2 boxes of shells each.  We would have a great time BS'ing and fooling around while carrying our rifles.  Safety was ingrained though when in town.

Once in a while we would get tired of the 2 mile walk and start acting foolish with the rifles.  Pretty quickly a cop would show up after a call from someone worried about our gun handling.  Then we would get him to give us a ride out of town.  They were pretty good to us and we didn't give them crap either.  It was a good time all around.

[Peng]

My 5th grade teacher literally told us to bring in our parents guns from the war so we could discuss and look at them.

We got a handful.  Imagine that today.  I mean,  it was stupid back then but now ?

 

[Valmet]

18 hours ago, Historian said:

Gun shops had a smell. It was a mix of gun oil, burnt powder, and bull carp from lots of people's stories. 

I'm gettin older and fewer stores have that smell. 

The last one I went into could be described as the Wet Seal of the gun world. I'm just not cool enough for that kind of store. 

Give me the gun shop of 40 years ago.

Hoppe’s 9 for me. My hometown gun shop, which I worked in in HS always smelled of Hoppes 9. While I’ve used Ballistol regularly since around 2011 I always keep Hoppes 9 in my cleaning kit 

[Historian]

5 hours ago, janice6 said:

 

I would go in there and sit for hours watching the guy make Saddles, Bullwhips, assorted tack for working and riding animals.  I loved the smell of the leather shop.  He would do his work and tell me what and how he was doing, while he did it.  I learned a new respect for the craftsmanship involved.

 

I have always admired people with skills like that.  They do things that take years to do well.  I have a buddy who owns a custom leather shop who makes holsters, belts, etc., on sewing machines designed for saddles made in 1918 and 1920.

Going to his place is like stepping back in time.

[Historian]

1 hour ago, Valmet said:

Hoppe’s 9 for me. My hometown gun shop, which I worked in in HS always smelled of Hoppes 9. While I’ve used Ballistol regularly since around 2011 I always keep Hoppes 9 in my cleaning kit 

Hoppes once made some air fresheners.  Damn i wish i had one for my truck.

[Huaco Kid]

Me and my friend's demonstration speech was about snakes.  I borrowed a boa from my brother's friend,  and my friend caught a garter snake.

I showed how to pick the boa up and told about him and we put a mouse in there but the snake didn't care.

The garter bit the **** out of my friend in front of the whole class.  The kind of bite where it won't let go.

We figured out later that it probably wasn't a garter.

[janice6]

4 minutes ago, Huaco Kid said:

Me and my friend's demonstration speech was about snakes.  I borrowed a boa from my brother's friend,  and my friend caught a garter snake.

I showed how to pick the boa up and told about him and we put a mouse in there but the snake didn't care.

The garter bit the **** out of my friend in front of the whole class.  The kind of bite where it won't let go.

We figured out later that it probably wasn't a garter.

Before I went to Kindergarten, I remember sneaking out the back yard into the neighbors Corn field and catching Garter Snakes.  We used to hold them and stick our finger in their mouth.  The teeth were like sandpaper.  Today I doubt I could approach any Snake, much less hold one.

 

One day the neighbor's wife brought over some Cake.  It looked like Chocolate so I had a piece.  I found out a few minutes later, it was what she called Blood Cake.  Made with, you guessed it.

My father at the time had about 1,000 Chickens for selling.  The neighbor had 5,000.  The neighbor went on to be one of the larger Chicken and Egg producers of the area.  My father went elsewhere.

Edited January 23, 2019 by janice6

[DWARREN123]

My number 1 gun shop was Western Auto. Brought my first rifle there, .22lr single shot bolt action to hunt vermin with.

I believe I was 9, got the rifle and 3 boxes of ammo with money I had saved from doing summer jobs.

Ah, the good old days.

[janice6]

When I got my first rifle, my father made me go out into the country every Saturday for the whole Summer, for required shooting practice.  He would point out a target of opportunity, and I HAD to hit it.  He was very aggressive that I learn how to shoot accurately and well.  He required that we go no matter what.  The last time we went together, he pointed to a shock of corn on a stalk that was sticking out on the corner of the field, and told me to shoot it.  I shot.  It wasn't an easy shot, but it wasn't too difficult either.  My eyes were young then.

He berated me for missing.  I told him I didn't miss!  He argued with me and told me to shoot again.  I did.  He said I missed again.  We argued.  Then we walked to the Corn stalk and looked at the shock.  One hole in it and he said, see, you missed one.  I shocked the corn cob and found one hole in one side and by some miracle, two exiting.  He didn't say a word and we never when practicing together again.  I went on my own after that.  It was a freak shot, but good enough for him.

He told me that if he ever caught me with a handgun he would shove it up my ass!  He hated them.  I never knew why, but I knew he had been a Deputy Sheriff in Cook County, Chicago during prohibition.  His family's farm was 40 miles South of Chicago.  I supposed it had something to do with that.

He talked of two brothers from either Kentucky or Tennessee, that were in his "unit" (I don't know now what they called it).  He used to say that those two would drive out of town and park on a dirt road.  One would start a large spike in a fence post, and they both would go to the fence on the other side of the road and use it for a target.  He said they were good shots.

[fiveoboy01]

15 hours ago, Historian said:

Hoppes once made some air fresheners.  Damn i wish i had one for my truck.

Did they actually smell like #9 though?

I guess I'm indifferent to the odor, but I definitely wouldn't want it for an air freshener.

[SC Tiger]

On 1/21/2019 at 11:25 PM, Historian said:

Gun shops had a smell. It was a mix of gun oil, burnt powder, and bull carp from lots of people's stories. 

I'm gettin older and fewer stores have that smell. 

The last one I went into could be described as the Wet Seal of the gun world. I'm just not cool enough for that kind of store. 

Give me the gun shop of 40 years ago.

Funny story in a gun shop:

Guy behind counter had an AR-15.  Was trying to remove the bolt.  Couldn't get the rifle to open.

My dad takes it, closes the bolt, pushes out the pin, and viola.  Rifle is open. 

Guy behind counter got all pissed.......

7 minutes ago, fiveoboy01 said:

Did they actually smell like #9 though?

I guess I'm indifferent to the odor, but I definitely wouldn't want it for an air freshener.

There's always this.....

[Dog Soldier]

It seems many here grew up in rural America "RFD".  I also remember getting on the bus with my rifle in the Fall. The driver would stack our rifles on the floor. On the trip home I would have him stop along the way. He handed me my Ole Winchester and I cut across country looking for a prime Elk.  Many of these freedoms exist to this day in the Western U.S.