Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Memorable experiences in a Gun Shop

We had an older gentleman come in to shoot on our range. We have a printed copy of our range rules that shooters have to read and initial, so they know what they can, and can't do. For some reason, so many people read the questions out loud while they're answering them. One of the questions asks how much firearms experience you have. He read it and answered aloud "I qualified Expert in the Army, so I must be an expert" (he was Nam-era). He then asked for some 20ga slugs for his slug gun. Five minutes later, he was back at the counter b*tching. "These shells won't shoot in my gun. It's probably because they're 2 3/4 and my barrel says 3 inch". I went out on the range to see what was wrong. He had an 870 slug gun and the barrel looked kinda big. I looked, and sure enough, it was a 12ga. The bad part of retail is you can't embarrass a dumbasz customer too much, but it was good for a laugh.

That's exactly right. I don't know how many times that I picked something from the sliding glass door cases to the right of the room or something that had just came in leaning onto to post at the corner of his desk and he'd say something like" I gave Joe Bob $400 for that but you're a good customer and I'll take $300 from you".
I don't remember buying a used gun from John ever for less than what he gave for it. Did I ever believe it? NO! That was just John and when you payed cash, he'd pull a wad the size of a soup can out of his pocket. People would bring him in meat from critters they had killed from everywhere and he had an old electric skillet "that looked like it had never been washed", sitting on a spool or table next to a fridge by his desk and the boys would cook mystery meat and sometimes offer some... I never tried any.
I remember going to "Wall's Store" when Sako Riihimaki's and Browning Safari's and Ithaca 4es' were wall to wall in the glass doored used gun cases.

We are all the poorer for the loss of businesses like John''s!

I spend 40+ hours a week behind the counter at my LGS, a few things of note:

While 2020 is a banner year for sales, there are A LOT of armed IDIOTS out there.

I can tell horror stories for days, but I pulled all of the 38 Super from the shelves, and put it behind the counter because I got tired of telling people: “no, that will NOT fit in your .38 Special revolver”.

A-to-Z Pawn in Blackfoot was owned by an old fellow named Lyle and his wife Virginia back in the 90s. Lyle was (is...I dropped in there last September and got filled in on what's gone on the last 25 years) a short little fellow, and kinda reserved. It was a pawn shop, but most of the business was guns back then. Lyle had a fellow named Buck working behind the counter (and others as well), and Buck was a pretty outgoing fellow. One day he asked Lyle if his mama used to dress him up in blue jeans when he was young, to which Lyle replied "yes, of course." Buck had set the hook...then he asked Lyle, "did she leave the zipper down so you could see where you were going?" The four of five guys standing around who witnessed this were practically rolling on the floor...Lyle got red faced and walked back to his office and wouldn't come back out. Great day, that was.

Doc's Gun Barn in Pocatello was a great place in the mid-90s. Small, but lots of inventory, and Doc Blanchard was a great guy to do business with. One day I spied a Norinco 1911 Compact in the display case...first I had ever seen, and I wanted it badly at first sight. I'd had two Norinco 1911A1s (I think I paid $205 for those back in '93 or '94). The 1911A1s were as reliable as stones. BUT, I had to have that Compact so I grabbed one of my A1s at home and went back down to Poky. No one was in the shop, but Doc and myself that morning. I laid my boxed pistol on the counter and told Doc I'd like to swap. He opened the box, picked up the pistol, and pulled the slide back just a bit while peering into the breech. Then he vigorously yanked the slide back and a live round ejected and landed on the counter, and there I stood with my mouth hanging open. Before I could say a word Doc just walked away and went back to his office or something. I'm sure he did that to give me a little time to think about what had just taken place. I had known better for many years long before that day, so all I can say to this day is "mea culpa," and I plead guilty that day at Doc's. We eventually conducted the trade, and part of the deal was I was to always triple check a gun for live ammo (and I've held up my end of that bargain to this day). Unfortunately, the Norinco Compact was a complete turd and I didn't keep it long. I wish I had thise two 1911A1s back!

The original Uncle Lee's in Greenville, KY had that same mount. I've admired it many times.

It was a great place. Went with a friend while he picked out a Browning O/U took us to the old Bank and there was a room full of Brownings. They said go thru and pick out which one you like. We were there for hours.

I had fresh catfish from that skillet on more than one occasion, caught out of the Grand River that morning. Right behind that old desk was where all the Browning 4 barrel sets were. He had 2 dozen of them one time I was in there. He had a fellow that stayed in the store at night since it had been broken into several times. The guy slept on a cot up on the loft right above Johns desk. A couple of loaded shotguns were on the cot during the day. I was told he had shot the front doors off the place more than once.

Youngster behind the counter at the big box sporting goods store. Nah... we dont have any 44-40, but you can shoot these 44 Magnum in it.

Many years ago the guys at Norm's Gun Shop in White River Junction, VT, kept a loaded revolver in a holster hanging on a pole behind the counter. I remember that I was looking at a rifle that I thought would be an unsuccessful combination of rifle and cartridge, a Savage 99C in 22-250, when I heard the "click...click" of a revolver hammer being cocked. I looked over my shoulder and saw a young boy holding a revolver unsteadily in one hand and aiming it in my general direction. I just started moving slowly to my right to get out of the line of fire. I might have said something, but don't remember.

One time while hangin at my favorite gun store a guy came in and was showing Jack, the owner pic's of a very large grizzlys tracks in the sand on the shore of a mountain lake, well it got my attention because I spent a long night at that lake in a pup tent with my wife and my dogs went crazy barking all night.

Well the customer in the next photo had a picture of the bear that left the tracks, that really got my interest. Then he told us after watching the bear for awhile it wandered off, so he went up the hill to see what the bear was up to. Well he found a dead Mature bighorn ram the bear was feeding on! holy crap! Then he showed us a pic of the full curl set of horns, he took them!

By this time Jack & I are thinking holy fuug. I asked him if anyone saw him with the skull? He said yes he showed them off... I then informed him he was lucky to be alive and the bear was probably sleeping off a full belly nearby and by the way possessing those horns was highly illegal. He was in disbelief and Jack said yep he is right. The guy said what should I do ? he left the shop in a hurry..

Oh and I was at that same lake a few weeks ago and ran into the Chuck Norris of Montana...... yep Shrapnel...

Thinking some of the strangest gun shop stories might be made this year.

I know the managers of a few gun shops, small & large. And they all agree that there a lot of scary or potentially dangerous customers are showing up these days. Folks wanting to buy guns & they don't even have a clue of which end is which. Of course there have been customers like that all along, but the mgrs. are telling me that the numbers of the totally uninitiated are staggering.
They've had to take appropriate measures & extra steps for some customers. To the extent of offering pre purchase training classes or down to simply refusing to sell to some. Even though a purchase might be legal, safety & common sense must overrule.

I expect the number of accidents will rise.

I was in a shop in Roseburg Or. in 2009 wanting to trade a Ruger Red Label 20 gauge in on a semi auto .40 cal. I looked at everything behind the glass but the guy I was dealing with didn’t want to trade. My kids were with me, my daughter was holding my right hand as I stood at the counter and she pulled away and wandered off to find her brother. Seconds later the ex Army “Armourer” that I was dealing with points an HK .40 at the glass and squeezes the trigger. The sound was deafening, dust dropped from the ceiling, and I’m frantically searching for my 3 kids.....
The bullet went through the glass, I felt something hit my leg which I later determined to be glass and the exit hole was at my daughters chest level. Had she been there she would have been gone.
The owner (Army guy’s father) came from a back office and was wringing his hands and wailing like a baby. Turns out he’s the genius who’d shot his hand at a gun show a few years prior.
They claimed later that Army guy “checked” the gun, which was a trade in, and that the extractor failed to remove a black cased Winchester cartridge.
I probably should have sued the shop but didn’t and of course never stepped foot in that establishment again.

Mostly my experience has been some turd behind the counter arrogantly playing up to his coterie of sycophants by being dismissive and demeaning...I don't say a thing just walk out and shop elsewhere.

My local gunshop is owned and run by a knowledgeable fellow that looks after his customers.

Probably the most unusual visit to a "gun shop" was back when I was about 12 or 13 in 1965... The Meier and Frank Store in the big shopping mall downtown Portland had a very upscale gun counter in one corner, right next to the pet store section of the store... I was lusting after some of the guns on the shelves- Purdys, Winchester 21's lined up, and several high end English shot guns. A guy walks up and asks to handle one of the beautiful shotguns and I watch from a few feet away as he swings and looks it over. He eventually asks the counter person- "$6,500?" and the guy answers yes... so, the customer pulls out a wad of cash and pays the guy while he puts it back in the factory box with all the accoutrements and he takes it home.. this was a time when $6500 was a lot of money- in fact it was the same price as a new AC Cobra or an upgraded Corvette at the time...

What was the most unusual about the visit, though was that right next to the gunshop was the pet store so I wandered over and looked at the animals for a while- which included a Lion cub, monkeys, and several other exotic species... I found out later my grade school buddy had a cousin had bought a lion cub there and raised it until it was several years old and treated it pretty much like a pet dog. I saw it once and it was a huge animal and afraid of people except for the owners...

I bought my p. dog hunting partner a Shilen Select match stainless barrel blank, and he took it to a gunshop where there was a gunsmith working in the back. He went to pick up the rifle, the gunsmith handed him the rifle, and he had a massive heart attack and died on the spot. It took me a while to get over this.

In a small town GS picking up a pistol and chatting about guns.....

Gamey lookin guy walks in and asks if he can buy a gun if he has a felony

“NO!!!”

We’re talking about it and 5 minutes later he walks back in and asks
“What if I don’t tell you about the felony?”

No one answered.......all were laughing too hard....

I was at Warshalls in Seattle way back in the day 40 some years ago.


I was looking at some guns and whenever the boss was not around, the employees would whisper to me what was wrong with the guns.

That giant old gunstore soon went out of business. Too bad, my father had them rebarrel a Win 1897 in the 1950s.

I sent a revolver to Ruger one time for a fix and they sent me a new pistol. Asked to send ffl info and I called my favorite gun shop; Thunderstik Trading co in Tucson AZ. Told them the story and they said I didn’t need an ffl as it was already my pistol, a replacement for a pistol I already owned didn’t need a transfer. I told them Ruger insisted and they argued but finally said they would do it for me as a favor but insisted they wouldn’t charge me a dime for the transfer and that Ruger was being unreasonable. Great folks. I miss that store.

A student at the Co School of Trades (gunsmithing) heated the plug on a ML to get it off, without first checking for load. Apparently no one on the intake of the piece had either.

I know this bcause I asked about the hole in the overhead of my table.....