Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 1st Centerfire Rifle You Shot

At about age 7, Dad let me shoot his old 94 Winchester .30/30, it rocked me pretty good. And I missed the pond I was shooting at 125 yards away.

Savage Model 340 in a 30-30

Sporterized 303 SMLE. traded a shotgun for it over a campfire at a gate entering Camp Blanding, FL. while waiting for someone to open the gate, thus allowing hunters to enter the areas open for deer hunting. This was in 1966 or 67. Fellow gave me a box of factory corelokts, I believe 215gr roundnose, of which I shot 3 or 4 rounds at a pine tree (after the sun came up) to see how accurate the rifle was. I didn't kill a deer that day but did the following weekend. Sold the rifle several years later.

I like that. My 99 in 243 went away long ago, but I've kept my 99 300 Svg for many years now.

Even kept the K2.5 in a pivot mount on top.

Your first was with a true Classic.

L2S

Winchester Model 1894 carbine in 25-35 when I was eight.

Winchester model 1917 in 30-06.

Same for me

Remington 722 in 244 Remington. I thought I was truly a man. Lol

M1 Garand

Pop's 1959 M70 - 243. I have it now.

I remember the first time I fired a shotgun, when I was 8, but I don't explicitly remember the first time I fired a CF rifle. I think it may have been an SMLE, when I was about 11 or 12. I do remember getting myself a .30/06 sporterised Mauser when I was about 12 and going to the range with several boxes of surplus ball ammo though. I came home with a bruised cheek, and a bruise on my shoulder in which you could actually see the imprint of the screws on the steel buttplate - as well as a grin a mile wide. It wasn't the first time I fired a CF rifle though.

Dan,

I actually fired a 12-gauge double before ever firing a centerfire rifle. I was barely 12, and was around 5'2" and maybe 105 pounds. The shotgun belonged to a friend of my father, and since my father was then recovering from a heart attack took pity on a young loony and after a morning small-game hunt let me shoot his double at a local dump-ground, at cans and bottles he threw into the air. I hit most of 'em--according to him, since I didn't see most break!

About 11 or 12 i got to shoot a BAR.

You know the one with the 20 round mag.

He was a friend of Dad's and showed me how to dig my toes in the dirt.

It moved me back about 12 inches.

I was all smiles for sure.

MD, mine was a 20 ga double which belonged to my grandfather. It had a steel buttplate too.

He set up an empty laundry liquid bottle, on a log, and I had a shot at it. The gun just about sat me on my arse, but the detergent bottle was pretty thoroughly peppered.

Later, when I was a bit bigger, I shot a lot of rabbits and ducks with that gun, before I bought myself a 12 ga auto when I was 14.

Remington 870 12 gauge. I was 10.... then a Win 94 in 30/30... Shot that at aged 10 also...

both put me on my ass, and made my shoulder black and blue...

but I did hit what I was aiming at both times....

And I still have both of those firearms....

A 1979 Marlin 336RC in .30-30, I delivered sandwiches for a summer to buy it used. Still have it!

Ruger 77 tang safety. Still have it. Shot great with factory rem 130gr C.L.

M1 Carbine that my father owned. The next summer I saved my hay hauling money and bought a sporterized (read hacked) Mauser in .243 Win from a pawn shop. It didn't have a safety and was a danger in the hands of a 15 year old me. I carved a block of wood to put behind the trigger when a round was chambered. It didn't take me long to figure out that wasn't safe either. Loaded for it with a Lee loader. It disappeared when my parents divorced in 1971 while I was in Vietnam. I replaced it with a Ruger M77RS flatbolt in .350RemMag that I still hunt with.

Winchester model 70 .243. Belonged to a buddies dad. He let me take a shot at a woodchuck out in the pasture with it. I missed but it was pretty far away. I think I was 10.

I don't recall but definitely a 12 gauge shotgun as a young teenager long before shooting a centerfire that would have been one of my uncle's varmint rifles - a Ruger 6mm PPC or a Remington 22-250 after I became an adult.

Shotguns and birds, especially 20 gauges were my first love. Rifles and big game came later.