Do you remember your first shot?

Boy Scout camp in Nebraska. Single shot .22. I was so excited I almost ran down range before the line was cold

Yes and no. My first kill was a squirrel my uncle helped me take with a 410. But I can’t recall if the shot the ruger single six first or after the shotgun. It was a long time ago.

I was about 8 and was deathly, horribly afraid of loud noises. Apparently my parents took me to a July 4 parade when I was a baby and they fired off a cannon right in front of where we were sitting. Since then I’d cower under the bed during thunderstorms and freak out when kids popped balloons at parties etc. anyway we were on some kind of family outing in the mountains and my dad had his Browning BL-22 and the other kids were shooting cans. Pretty sure he basically made me try it. I was terrified. But I did it and it of course wasn’t horrible. I was cured on the spot and it was all downhill from there.

In a galaxy long ago and far away I got my first shot off. I believe I was about 5 and my uncle who couldn’t enlist for ww2 ( he had Polio as a youngster which left him with a permanent limp [you’d be hard put to keep up witH him out hunting]) took me out with him to run his trap line traps were all empty that day but we did some plinking with the 22 he had. I missed everything I shot at … he laughed and said I’d get the hang of it. Once I learned about sight pictures … I did. That was about 75 years ago. I still prefer iron sights.

YMCA Camp Crockett near Rye, Colorado, about 1952, eight years old, some bolt action single shot .22 LR, shooting at a pine cone balanced on a 2x4 about 10 yards away, prone position. I hit it and the pine cone tumbled off the board.

It was a fluke. I could not repeat the shot. But the exhilaration and cheers from my fellow campers have sustained me for over 70 years.

My first shot was with a 20 gauge Berreta single shot. My dad wanted us to join him on his weekend hunting trips at Collier's Mill in New Jersey.

We had to take an NRA Safety Course to be able to hunt and had to fire the gun to prove our proficiency. We met at a Trap & Skeet range and after class we had to fire three rounds to show we were safe.

This was back in 1959. I spent a lot of wonderful times with my dad and that shotgun. I wanted it but since I moved and was stationed in the Air Force in Arizona Dad didn't want to go through the hassele of shipping the gun so he gave it to my cousin.

I didn't shoot a handgun until I was 24. It was a Colt Government Model in .45. I started shooting USPSA matches, learned a lot and safely shot for almost 50 years before getting too sick to be able to hold a gun.

Five years later I am out of my wheelchair and shooting Steel Challenge Matches. It's all fun and when it's no longer fun I will give up.

One day, when I was about 10, my dad said let's go for a ride. We drove downtown to the Ace hardware, if memory serves, and he came out with a box. He didn't tell me what it was; we just drove out to a patch of land we had outside the city. There he took a brand new Winchester Model 150 lever action 22 caliber rifle out of the box. In addition, he produced a little box of 50, count 'em, 50 rounds of ammunition. He then scrounged up a bunch of items that passing motorists left at the side of the road. Strangely, I remember amongst them an old potato and a shotgun shell.

He took these thoughtfully furnished items, and set up a bunch of makeshift targets in a part of the woods where it was safe to shoot. I don't remember how many rounds we shot between the two of us, but the memory of shooting a "Cowboy" rifle with Dad steadying it, and showing me how to use the sights properly, still remains with me some 55 years later. Most impressively, Dad had stuck the shotgun shell into the soft earth a bit, then set the potato on top of it, carefully balanced. When it came his turn to shoot, he shot the shell out from under the potato! No kid was ever more impressed by his Dad's marksmanship than I was that day. And my admiration wasn't diminished at all when he said he'd actually been aiming at the potato.

I can't help but think that if Dads still did that (or if families even had dads these days), this country would be a better place.


Yes, this is it, the most valuable rifle I own, the 1964 Winchester Model 150. No matter to me it was one of the worst rifles Winchester ever sold. To this guy, it's priceless.

My dad and his old friend took me out to an old quarry once when I was 8. They had me start out with a Ruger speed-six, 357 (probably had 38s in it). Trying to shoot bottle caps....id aim and miss, aim and miss.... my dads friend said "don't aim so much. Just point at the damn thing". And sure enough I hit that bottle cap.
my dad bought that ruger that day, and I still have it!
Here it is, hangin out with a gp

My first hunting trips were with my uncle and dad. Uncle Allen had a .270 topped with a weaver 2 1/2 to 4 1/2 scope which he hand loaded for. This was back about 1951.
When I was 11 the first cartridge gun I fired was a Winchester pump 22WRF and my uncle's High Standard .22 revolver.

6 years old and a Ruger Single six with LRs in it. Then same year it was a .410. I was hooked.

My first shot ... yup, remember it well. When I was about 10, I was farmed out to one set of grandparents for a week or two while a baby brother was being brought into the world, and while there, one of my uncles, who was what they called back then a "junk dealer", took me to the town dump to help him look for junk, and to shoot rats with one of his .22 rifles.

I remember my first handgun. A relative was a beat cop and brought his duty gun up to the family farm one summer.

He had a Colt .38 either an OP or PPS. Wadcutters and no hearing protection. It started me on a lifelong handgun career. Thanks, John.

No I don't. I was too young to remember.

Yep, I do remember.

It was the summer before I started 1st grade,,,
So I was just over 4 1/2 years old.

My Grandfather always had this small revolver,,,
I the pocket of his Jeans jacket.

He called it his "Owl's Head Pistol",,,
Because it had an owl's head on the grip,,,
If I recall correctly that makes it an Iver Johnson.

Anyways, we lived on an island (Drummond Island) in U-P Michigan,,,
He let me shoot 3 rounds into a tree stump in the back yard.

I've been "hooked" ever since.

Aarond

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My first shot other than countless hours on a bb gun, was a 12ga side by side shotgun at around 10 years old. A couple of Dads in my neighborhood took me out shooting for the first time. It knocked me on my rear end and the addiction begun...

Probably somewhere around 1948 I think. A Stevens Crackshot 22 which I still have that was my paternal grandfather's gun. The target was a tin can of the day.

NRA Benefactor Golden Eagle

boy scout camp around 1990, 22lr single shot bolt action. we had to pop a balloon downrange and i was missing on purpose just to get more shots in. to this day im always trying to get more shots in.

My first shot with anything other than a BB gun was with an Ithaca Model 37 in 16gauge when I was 8 years old.

I was with my older brother, he was 7 years older than me and had been hunting for a few years with our father.
Anyway ... He tied a tin can to a clothesline and told me to shoot it with the shotgun.
He cautioned to hold the butt about an inch from my shoulder so it wouldn't kick.
Funny guy, my older brother...
I got a huge bruise on my shoulder, my glasses flew off and the receiver hit me in the face.
My brother promised to beat me up if I told our parents what happened.

People wonder why I have trust issues...

I remember. No guns in my family growing up. My parents weren't anti gun; they just weren't a priority. I found out later my Mom (now with the Lord) grew up shooting.

We visited the family farm of some friends when I was about 10. Their youngest son was about my age. He had his own single shot bolt action .22 rifle. I have no idea what it was. He of course did grow up shooting, and his folks had no qualms about his taking me out to shoot and my parents didn't object. Just shot tin cans in one of the pastures.

I don't recall shooting again until a few years later when another friend was gifted a .270 for his birthday. I don't remember the range where we shot it or how we got there (probably his Dad); I do remember that I didn't like the recoil. That's the only time I've ever shot a .270. Guns didn't become a real interest for me until college and after.

NorthBorder said:

I would guess the year was 1967 and I was about 9 years old.

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Well for me it was 1957 and I was 7 years old. Growing up NYC there was no place to shoot but then the Thanksgiving weekend of '57 my uncle and grandfather took me upstate NY hunting. My uncles friend gave me a 22 rifle to drag around, up the mountain and down the mountain. No ammunition of course but it was fun. Then after the grown ups were done in the afternoons I was given a box of 22 ammo and they began teaching me the fundamentals of shooting. Well all good things have to come to an end as did that Thanksgiving weekend. As we were leaving my uncle's friend came out and motioned us to stop. My uncle stopped and the trunk opened and closed. Charlie, my uncle's friend gave me that rifle. The first gun I ever shot.



The Remington 510P pictured on the top. No clue how old it actually is but I have had it about 65 of my 72 years. It will be passed on and likely the first gun my latest grandson will shoot.

Ron

It was a 12gauge shotgun at a local turkey shoot, might have been 12 or 13 years old. Just remember being surprised by the amount of recoil and how much my shoulder hurt. Was pretty small for my age, maybe weighed 100 lb. or so.

First a shot with whut? My Red Rider?

.45 Kentucky rifle, age 11. Neighbor was a big time outdoors-man, and let me shoot it. That was my introduction to firearms. It was the 1st gun I ever made too, out of a kit. Still got it, but haven't fired it in 35 years. That pointy buttstock is not kind to the shoulder.

I don't remember my first shot. It was probably summer camp when I was 8 or 9. I do remember the first shot I took with a 12 gauge shotgun. I was about 10 and I thought I had nocked my shoulder out of place. It was a few years before I shot a 12 gauge again.

Night Rider said:

Boy Scout camp in Nebraska.

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Man, my dad sent my brother and me to a summer camp in Northern Wisconsin (owned and sponsored by a Christian college in Illinois) in the '60s -- .22 rifle shooting AND archery! We were in absolute heaven (when we weren't getting our canoes swamped). Is it just me being nostalgic, or are our own children being thoroughly deprived in this modern era?