Do you remember your first shot?

First shot? Im not 100% sure when it was so I can’t be positive. (I was a youngster though!)

My first shotgun shot I do recall, my Grandfather took a picture. I was turning 10 in 1977 and wanted to hunt with him. I believe the shotgun was a Stevens 94(?), I do know the shells were 3” Federal 7.5’s, those were Grandpas favorites.

That year was my first crack at mourning doves. (Doves 1, Me 0.) I Missed my only shot that year.



Stay safe.

My first shot with a firearm was in the Army, with a Valmet assault rifle, when I was 19. After the service it took some 20 years before I bit the bullet and started shooting pistols at a commercial range. It has been downhill ever since...

When I was 7 my Dad and some of his buddies were going out to a farm to sight in their deer rifles. I wanted to go along so he let me.
I kept asking my Dad if I could shoot. I was fascinated with guns, still am.
Finally one of his smarta**ed buddies said I could shoot “the double barrel”. So they gave me this big ol’ 12 gauge. The thing was longer than I was tall, but I was determined to shoot it. It had snowed and the ground was wet as temps warmed a bit. I held the gun up to my shoulder. It took everything I had to aim at a milk jug. I recall my Dad telling me “Whatever you do, don’t drop that shotgun!” and I couldn’t figure out why he thought I would drop it.
I pulled the trigger, it kicked like a mule and the next thing I knew I was flat on my butt sitting up holding the shotgun and everyone was laughing and cheering. Apparently the jug was no more.
My Dad’s friend Virgil grabbed the shotgun and helped me up. I remember the big smile he gave me then he asked if I would like to shoot a real rifle and not some shotgun. I remember saying “Yes” and the pain in my shoulder disappeared and the annoyance of cold wet pants dissipated at the thought of shooting a rifle.
I do not recall what kind of rifle it was but it had a scope and I think it was a .243, but I am not sure. I do recall some discussion about having me shooting the lightest recoiling gun that was there that day.
I shot 2 rounds at a target that was a looong way off…probably 75 yards.
I missed with the first shot but with some coaching I hit the paper with the second shot just above the 5” or 6” bullseye.

What a day!

I was in 6th grade, plus or minus a year. Not sure if I shot my friend’s Red Ryder first, or .22’s with my uncle and cousins.

I was about 7 or 8 about in 1959. The gun was a Remington Targetmaster model 41. single shot 22. I wasn't strong enough to support the rifle as it was adult sized gun. My uncle poked it thru the hog wire fence in the barn yard to support the fore end and I shot thru the fence down into a big drainage ditch. Don't remember what the target was but it started a love affair with 22 rifles that lasted a lifetime. I am 71 now and own around 10 -22s!!

Bull

I remember my older brother taking me to the woods behind the house & putting tin cans at the edge of a creek & we had a good time knocking them into the creek. I was only about 8 or 9 & we were shooting his Sears & Roebuck .22 rifle. It was a .22 short single shot & I think he was shooting .22lr because we always had trouble getting the spent cases out of the gun. He had to use his pocket knife to pry out the empty case after every shot, but it was a lot of fun anyway.

No.............

It's been 50 years, but my first shot was with a 22 bolt action rifle open sights, I don't actually remember the distance. We, my family always rode motorcycles in Murphys sand and gravel pit in the town of vestal. We met 2 brothers Dave and sedrick, this particular day, Dave was out shooting and I stopped to chat, the whole time checking out his rifle, when he asked if I'd like to shoot it, I was like oh yeah, well I got one shot, then we walked out to check the target, it had several holes in it already. One was on the x ring that he said was my shot, whether it was or not but instilled a sense of pride then and taught me more than I knew then. Now I shoot with my yiunger grandchildren I always shoot on the same targets, and give them the the same sense of pride for out shooting me.

[QUOTE="MifflinKid].22 LR in a rifle at a Boy Scout camp. Some time in the early 1960s.[/QUOTE]

Not counting BB guns it was the same for me and more than a few others. Boy Scout Camp was fun. Probably more so now that they let in girls.

17 yrs old, Jan of 86, Ft Jackson SC M16A1

Sadly, no. Not when I took my 1st shot and not which firearm it was. I had the pleasure of growing up shooting frequently and with numerous firearms; it was second nature...nothing memorable or out of the ordinary.

Think I was 8 or 9 years old, really can't remember, but my friend's dad took us out to the country. They were shooting clay pigeons. They handed me the loaded 12-gauge and told me to shot the disk when it went up. So I did, and one guy jumped back. They were around me in a half circle extending out to my sides front ways and said the shot came close to the one guy's nose. Needless to say, that was the only shot I had that day. It threw me back but I did not fall, seems I went back a foot or so. Thing is, they did not give me near enough instruction (really none at all) and they all should have been behind me not curving out in front at the sides. At least that is how I remember it.

Yes, I do. It was in a shooting gallery in an amusement park in Connecticut. It was a gallery pump .22 loaded with frangible .22 shorts.
The park is gone for many years. The memory remains.

I vaguely remember my first shot. M16A2 on loan to me from Uncle Sam at a 25m zero target. I got started pretty late in life.

When graduating from the BB gun, my first shot with a firearm was a single shot .22 LR "skeleton" gun, I think called the Bronco. My dad still has it and it will be given to me. I can still remember working that action and using the big chunky iron sights on it. I don't recall the target though.

1996, I was 13, and the gun was a Nylon 66. One of our family friends gave it to us, as every farm should have a rifle on it lol.
My dad and I walked down the road a ways from the house and fired a few shots, pulling the handle every time until one of us, I dont remember who, noticed it was ejecting live rounds every time we did......yeah not gun people in the slightest.
While that experience might not have been the catalyst for this obsession, its likely what solidified it for me since I can still remember how excited I was to be firing something that actually went BANG!

I spent plenty of time behind air guns before that tho....crossman 760, and 2100, daisy 880....wore more than a few of those out.

Just poured a shot of Jose Quervo,
first one of the evening.

That I can remember...

Hey, use care out there!

1976B.L.Johns. said:

Just poured a shot of Jose Quervo,
first one of the evening.

That I can remember...

Hey, use care out there!

Click to expand...

Ha! I was just about to settle down to a shot of Legacy Canadian and a cup of coffee myself. Thought I check THR one more time before shutting the computer off for the night.

Well , it must have been around 1970 i was around 9 or 10 years old late spring my Uncle was teaching me about Gun Safety (dad was long gone he had better things to do) it was a single shot 20 Gauge break action . The old 20 gauge didnt knock me on my ass , but it sure got my attention ! I recall it kicking more that I"d thought it would . Later that summer we took out His Belgian Browning .22 Semi Automatic Rifle I thought that was the sweetest thing ever .No recoil and a scope ! That made the target easy for a near sighted kid to see even a Hundred Yards away

Not my first shot. But I remember my first rabbit with my first gun. Stevens 410 single shot. 60 years ago.

I was about ten years old at the time. The day before my father spent some time at the dining room table explaining the front and rear sight alignment with a cardboard cut out and also trigger pull.
The next day my father and a I with a friend travelled to a sand pit near Picatinny Arsenal which was about a half hour away. When we arrived we set up some clay birds and carboard targets. My fathers friend was shooting his M1 carbine and my father was showing me the prone position and safety on the Marlin bolt action.
Boy it didn't take me long to be hooked. Best day I ever had!

First shot? Heck I don’t remember what I had for breakfast. Oh wait I’m eating Shredded Wheat.

jeepnik said:

First shot? Heck I don’t remember what I had for breakfast. Oh wait I’m eating Shredded Wheat.

Click to expand...

Trying to remember whether or not I even ate breakfast is an accomplishment and leaves me tuckered out.

My first shooting of a firearm was in about 1970, give or take a year or two. It was on a little 60 acre property we owned outside of Klondike, Texas (Delta County, NE Texas). The rifle was an adult-sized single shot .22 with a "hair trigger." I remember nobody wore hearing protection and it seemed quite loud. It did have a 'hair trigger,' actually, it had the kind of trigger I would like on a lot of my rifles.

I also learned to shoot my father's .38 SPL duty pistols on that property, BB guns, and my brother's guns. I have no idea exactly where that land is located now, but have fond memories of being there. Last time I was there was maybe 41 years ago and it was sold off shortly after that.

I had a Winchester 190 22LR as my first rifle at 10 years old, other than BB guns before that. I don't remember the first shot exactly, but the first few times out target shooting with my dad on a friend's farm.

I do however remember the first shot a year later when I inherited my grandfather's Remington Model 10 12 GA pump-action shotgun. It hurt like a lot, because I wasn't holding it close enough into my shoulder.

I handed it to my dad, like I was saying " thanks but no thanks."

My dad handed it back to me and said something along the lines that if you fall off a horse the first thing you do is get back on. I had ridden horses before, but had never fallen off.

He positioned the butt of the shotgun how it should be, pulled tight into my shoulder. The second shot went off with no trouble, and it's been smooth sailing from there on.

My dad was a WWII and Korean War veteran. 20 years US Army Air Corps/US Air Force, followed by 8 years in the Air Force Reserves. I'm grateful, thinking of him today this Memorial Day.