22 or a shotgun around here back in the dirty thirties. My Grandad says he almost never saw a coyote back then and if someone saw one go in a thicket somewhere and not come out they’d get a bunch of guys together and circle them up and do a drive. Only other varmints around here were coons, skunks, opossums, and hawks. All of them were handled with a 22 or birdshot. Great Grandad did shoot a bear out of a tree when he was 16 out by his folks’ homestead. That was in 1919 and he used a shotgun which more than likely was full of birdshot.
Weren’t any deer around and no season if there were any. The banker in town had a 270 that was about the only CF rifle I’ve heard of being around back then. The only reason I’ve heard of it was that he’d loan or rent it out to guys going out of state to hunt and Great Grandad took it to CO one year and shot a bear.
