A dear elderly friend and all-around outdoorsman and firearm loonie i’ve mentioned here number of times, tells the most wonderful and color-filled stories from his youth (he’s 87 now). He was evidently the Huckfinn of rural NJ in those days.
One is how he and two pals just in their early teens, pooled their money and bought a milsurp trapdoor at the hardware store, and how the store owner would allow them to purchase one round per day to shoot (in the gravel pit), plucked from some crate “pretty sure came from the Spanish-American war, i dunno!,” he’d recall with a chuckle.
Present day, fondest memories with him are visiting a semi-secret antique gun honeyhole located in an old feed store back home together, the proprietor too knowing him for many years now. His legs will last about two hours of browsing, and in that time his keen eye will locate every rarity and notable, and I’ll enjoy hearing a few stories retold, and the occasional new story, and the discussions to follow at the dinner table reliving it all into the weeee hours of the morning. Priceless. Like GF says, wish could record those moments and stories effectively for posterity.
