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I figuratively grew up with firearms. I didn't see a poll item for that. I think I'm supposed to be offended.
Yes you should be offended
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I grew up on a farm, driving tractors and old trucks, occasionally bulldozers and backhoes, even an ancient dragline. I milked cows, fixes fences, rode my dirt bike through the cow pastures and logging roads. I've helped cut down acres of trees and planted acres of new ones. I've been up at 2am pulling a calf or treating a cow for milk fever, not to mention branding, dehorning, vaccinating, etc...
All these things are a part of my past and who I am today. My kids on the other hand, are growing up in town. They play video games and ride their bikes. They won't know either work or freedom like I did at their age. I can't help but feel like they might be missing out on something.
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Huntin' grouse with a .22 doesn't sound like a bad idea....
amusicman2 - Was it a Stevens Crackshot?
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I'm not sure my uncle has it. I'll have to ask him. The 20ga was my Champion which is now a 16ga.
here's a 'not your usual raised with firearms' story..
my step-dad was a mildly successful businessman who was handy as hell with his hands, never into firearms...one day in 66' he wandered into the downtown Abercrombie and Fitch, back when it was THE store for outfitting big game safaris. Got to looking over the craftsmanship of the rifles, bought a book on gunsmithing they had, came home and devoured it. Within weeks our suburb home garage, which he always kept spotless, had new work benches, lathe, drill press, bunch of exotic tools, and he was spending every minute not at work, working in the garage.
6 months later he walked back into A&F with his custom built 30-06 featuring curly maple stock inlaid with Rosewood and African ebony, Mauser action, etc, etc...old salts behind the gun counter gave it the heavy look over, and highly impressed with the work offered to put the rifle on consignment in the store window at $1500, a whole lotta money back then...it sold in a week
So he began building custom rifles on commission from A&F, usually a couple a year..he also built for himself, liked to experiment at the range with different loads..get bored, sell the rifle, build another in a different caliber...and yet never hunted, raised a city boy with no taste for it.
after a decade or so he moved from firearms to drawing, which became his passion all the way to a too early passing from cancer, leaving behind some fine work.
my step-dad was a mildly successful businessman who was handy as hell with his hands, never into firearms...one day in 66' he wandered into the downtown Abercrombie and Fitch, back when it was THE store for outfitting big game safaris. Got to looking over the craftsmanship of the rifles, bought a book on gunsmithing they had, came home and devoured it. Within weeks our suburb home garage, which he always kept spotless, had new work benches, lathe, drill press, bunch of exotic tools, and he was spending every minute not at work, working in the garage.
6 months later he walked back into A&F with his custom built 30-06 featuring curly maple stock inlaid with Rosewood and African ebony, Mauser action, etc, etc...old salts behind the gun counter gave it the heavy look over, and highly impressed with the work offered to put the rifle on consignment in the store window at $1500, a whole lotta money back then...it sold in a week
So he began building custom rifles on commission from A&F, usually a couple a year..he also built for himself, liked to experiment at the range with different loads..get bored, sell the rifle, build another in a different caliber...and yet never hunted, raised a city boy with no taste for it.
after a decade or so he moved from firearms to drawing, which became his passion all the way to a too early passing from cancer, leaving behind some fine work.
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Hey, forgot to ask, how's that Champion working out for you now?
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Great just like it should. Haven't gotten a mole yet but haven't sat around in the yard to much either.
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Cap guns and rubber band guns are my earliest memory (Age 4?) in Sacramento, then BB guns at age 5 when we moved to a house about 12 miles north of Corvallis, Oregon. We shot way too many Barn Swallows and Tree Swallows with them. Then it was on to 22s shooting blue jays out of the filbert trees. Shotguns filtered in along the way. Some pheasant hunting around the ranch with my brother's (Sears?) 20 gauge pump around age 10. First big bird hunt was for chukar on the Snake River at age 12 with an Ithica .410 single shot. (No, I did not get a chukar!).
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Shooting since I was 6 or 7, somewhere in there.
My Grandpa was a WWII vet in the CB's, then a motorcycle cop for the city of Vancouver. He used to haul me around to Grange halls, VFW halls, Elks Lodge etc. for the gun swaps as he called them. Took me to the police range in the 1960's and taught me gun safety.
My first gun ever was a Winchester 94. My first gun from my Grandpa was a Colt Trooper in .22 long rifle. He always said over and over "There is one brand of gun and it's a Colt, there's one brand of motorcycle and it's a Harley (or Honky as he called them). I miss my grandpa a lot, he was one heck of a role model.
My Grandpa was a WWII vet in the CB's, then a motorcycle cop for the city of Vancouver. He used to haul me around to Grange halls, VFW halls, Elks Lodge etc. for the gun swaps as he called them. Took me to the police range in the 1960's and taught me gun safety.
My first gun ever was a Winchester 94. My first gun from my Grandpa was a Colt Trooper in .22 long rifle. He always said over and over "There is one brand of gun and it's a Colt, there's one brand of motorcycle and it's a Harley (or Honky as he called them). I miss my grandpa a lot, he was one heck of a role model.
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Looking back through the thread and ran across this post.
I find it interesting that, as we grow more "knowledgeable" about firearms and hunting, how we gain a stock pile of specialty guns ("the elk rifle", "the duck gun", etc.), but way back when, when we got that first gun, we inevitably used it for EVERYTHING.
It was like a buddy we could rely on time and time again. No matter the situation, yer buddy was there to help you out.
Funny how we move away from that after a while, only to eventually figure out we were doing just fine, just how we were...and for those who always stuck with that first gun and only that first gun (maybe adding to it, but never replacing it), my hat's off to you for having the incredible foresight to know you were right in the first place.
We should all be so wise.
...anyway, apologies for the derail. Just felt it needed to be posted.
Now back to the thread.....
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Reloading and hunting since I was 10. Got my first mulie about 14 on the Oregon Idaho border .
My second shotgun was an Ithaca 37 that I bought from the same pawn shop that same year... it wasn't that I was unhappy with the 31TC, I just wanted that Ithaca!!! 12ga 26" Modified choke. It was a great gun for 16yd trap. Kept both for many years... the third shotty was a cheapo H&R 12ga 28" O/U that I used mostly for wabbits... it was surprisingly pretty for an H&R. Good bluing, cheap wood really, I cracked the stock in a fall, but it was pretty, and light weight.
H&R model 1212:
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...and now I've learned something....never knew H&R made an O/U.
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I was shocked when I found it in the store way back then. And it didn't look like the single shot H&R quality, nor their revolvers. I don't know where they had them made, but it was a surprisingly nice shotgun!
Please teach that young lady to get her left thumb out of the way before she gets it bitter.
Been there, done that... it really does hurt! She only do it once tho...
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H&R did make some quality stuff from time to time. I have an H&R M1 Garand from the '50s.
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