Growing up a little bit wild in the 1970s and ’80s, the question of just what was “my first gun” is sort of complicated.
First off, none of this is legal advice – or advice of any kind – and this is just my own personal gun journey, warts and all. Remember to properly store and use all firearms in line with published safety guidelines.
Now, let’s get into it.
As a short background, I grew up with a grandfather who was a retired career NCO with 30 years of military service in exotic places like Persia and Indochina that I couldn’t find on the map any longer. His house was filled with four sons: my uncles, who were all slightly older than me and were effectively like big brothers. However, my feisty 4-foot-10-inch German-born Nana, who had only escaped the Communists by sneaking across the Iron Curtain 15 years before I hit the ground, ran the show.
Raised in Eastern Georgia and Gulf South Mississippi as part of the aforementioned tribe, with the Russians and their pals seemingly coming any minute, guns were a part of my life.
My grandpa carried a Smith & Wesson J-frame every day, even though there wasn’t a CCW law at the time. It was the same one he had carried “just in case” while in Vietnam. We all knew about the M1911 in his dresser in a Schrodinger’s cat kind of way – the same way we knew of the old Stevens pump gun behind the workbench at his TV repair shop. He had a locked glass-cased oak gun cabinet in the den filled with war bringbacks (Chicom SKS, Korean War Mosin, and Mausers), hunting shotguns (he loved Browning humpback A5s), and deer rifles (Winchester 70s).
My Nana also EDC’d – a .25 Baby Browning in her purse and a .38 in the glove box of her baby blue Lincoln Continental land yacht – long before EDC was cool. She also stockpiled food and hid it everywhere. It was common to look under the couch for a lost shoe and find it hiding among cans of peas and bags of rice. As a survivor of both der Nassis and der Kommies, she was a believer in all forms of insurance. That was probably why she had an M1 Carbine that shared space in PawPaw’s gun case.
Guns were just a part of life.
As a bit of a gun and war nerd, even as a kid, my favorite TV shows (“Jonny Quest,” “Combat!,” “S.W.A.T.”, “The Rat Patrol,” “Battlestar Galactica”) and movies (“The Outlaw Josey Wales,” “Patton,” “A Bridge Too Far,” “The Longest Day,” “Kelly’s Heroes,” “The Duellists”) as a youth, all leaned towards things very loud, sharp, and/or explosive.
https://youtu.be/Y6ikO6LMxF4
“The Shot Heard ‘Round the World” was my favorite episode of Schoolhouse Rock.
I felt like I would end my short life either in a duel over a matter of personal honor or in holding off the enemy so that others could get away. Either way, I would be remembered and people would tell my story.
What else could a kid ask for than an honorable death, right?
With that, I had plenty of toy guns easily at hand and preferred my M1-style Thompson knock-off as it was handy and effective. Haven’t you seen, like, any war movies at all? Manning my big wheel, I was ready.
Neighborhood: well under control.
I also made sure to have a backup Colt Peacemaker cap gun (with the roll inside) and trained to transition when the Tommy gun ran empty after clearing out the first wave.
I was pulling this off in 1977. What’s your excuse?
Like my uncles, things got ballistic by the time I was five when I got my first air gun for Christmas: the classic Daisy Red Ryder, which could hold like 500 .177-caliber BBs in its reservoir magazine. It came with a three-slot wooden gun rack that I helped hang on the wall by my bed. My favorite target was the clothesline post, which gave a satisfying “ping” when hit from 20 feet away. The Daisy was only just powerful enough to get you in trouble (I had it confiscated by my grandfather for two weeks after I shot out a window while aiming at an old TaB can that was…in front of the window) while not being strong enough to cause too much damage (I saw a BB bounce off the chest of an ugly crow, to my utter dismay).
A year of learning with the Daisy brought a Crosman Pumpmaster the following Christmas. With 10 pumps on that bad boy, I could part a cloud in half. Should the Russkies or Cylons pop up, I would have been ready, for sure – I would just have to pump it up to 11 for the former and 12 for the latter. There’s a 300-year-old oak tree in Pascagoula that probably still has 5,000 pellets embedded deep in its rings.
The next Christmas came my first “real gun,” a Marlin Model 60 .22 rimfire capable of firing 17 shots as fast as I pulled the trigger. Things were getting real. I wasn’t allowed to shoot the Marlin in the backyard due to “the neighbors” despite my protestations, but I was allowed to keep it on my gun rack. With the Marlin came more organized range time with shooting benches and graded targets – the whole nine yards. Likewise came 4-H Clubs and Scouts, where I was able to start honing my marksmanship skills in a formalized way. Youth squirrel hunts became a thing.
My first shotgun was a Remington 870 in 12 gauge. That sweet second or third-hand Woodmaster with a chipped stock (I promise I didn’t do it) was easy to use with birdshot on doves but soon got a lot more kick to it when moving up to No. 3s for geese later on. Plus, it was funny how doves proved a lot harder to hit than some clays tossed into the air by my Uncle Thomas.
My first centerfire rifle was a hand-me-down milsurp German K98 Mauser that was taller than I was, and with which I harvested my first deer at the ripe old age of 8 at a range of 70 of my Uncle Robert’s steps. While I was proud of the achievement, my Nana wasn’t overly impressed and pointed out that she had taken boar (whatever those were) at about the same age with her dad in the Harz Mountains, which I was informed were too far away to go to at the time (and behind “The Wall,” although I didn’t understand what Pink Floyd had to do with it.)
Looking back, I think it was the BB gun window incident that led to me getting glasses.
Later down the road came my first handgun, an old J-frame I had seen someplace before (“If you have a car, you should have a pistol,” said my grandfather).
Then the first gun I purchased with my own money: an H&R “crack barrel” 12-gauge single-shot bought for $20 cash-and-carry when I was 16 at a flea market, something that would probably be frowned upon today.
Over time, as my grandparents and uncles faded away into old photos and memories, I still have had lots of “firsts,” such as my first 1911, first Glock, first 10mm, first AR, first AK, first bullpup – well, you get the idea.
While some would look back on my story and throw proverbial rocks at my family and childhood, saying my upbringing instilled in me fear of the unknown, I understand that instead, they filled my heart with the opposite: with love and the mutual respect of trust.
Moreover, I have contributed to other people’s firsts. My daughter is a great shot with an old P229 of mine.
I’ve got two grandsons and a granddaughter, who will be offered their firsts when they are old enough. At this stage of my life, I am looking at my gun safe differently and more in terms of what they will inherit one day.
What can I say? Guns are a part of life in my family.
Things change. Or do they?