By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
My dad was a mechanic, and after my folks split up when I was maybe 11 or 12, he didn’t have a lot.
What he did have was a Harrington & Richardson Model 922, and when it came to me in a shoe box one Christmas Eve (my birthday is on Christmas Day) it meant more than anyone could have known at the time. A double-action which had a loading slot on the right side, but no way to eject the empties other than removing the cylinder and popping them all out at once with a push of the cylinder pin.
But I practiced with that “9-gun” and found that it shot to center by holding at about 5 o’clock. I was able to hit floating beer cans (his, not mine) in a river while my dad observed approvingly.
Later on, while hunting raccoons with a mentor who owned hounds, working with that revolver honed my skills. From that point forward, my interest in handgun marksmanship was carved in stone.
One year, dad had swapped a guy for an old Hy Hunter single-action imported sixgun and we made a trade. He got his revolver back and I got a gun with which my speed from the holster improved. I shot some raccoons with that gun, too.
The years passed, I started working in journalism, tucked money away and bought my first .357 Magnum, a Model 19 Smith & Wesson with a 6-inch barrel and patridge front sight. That revolver, which now occupies a special place in my safe, was dead-bang accurate. It has thousands of rounds through it, both .38 Special and full-house magnums. At some point, I swapped out the factory grips for a set of Herrett’s Shooting Stars and carried it in a Safariland shoulder holster during the hunting seasons.
Later would come other wheelguns, from S&W and Ruger. My first .41 Magnum was a Blackhawk with a 6 ½-inch barrel; the revolver I used to take my first mule deer buck with a handgun so many years ago. At least my two sons, both very young at the time, were there to watch, and the expressions on their faces were a mix of “Wow!” and “My Dad did that!”
It was probably all the shooting I did with that old H&R .22-caliber wheelgun in the woods with no hearing protection, in the heat of the hunt, which is responsible for the tinnitus now haunting my eardrums. Shooting bigger guns in the field didn’t help, either!
But at this time of year, I like to remember how my dad, who gave me one of his prized possessions, probably was more responsible for who I turned out to be than most other life experiences. Certified as a pistol instructor, loyal to the Second Amendment, published gun writer, author or co-author of several books dealing with guns, politics, self-defense and crime; it wasn’t his fault, but he certainly had an influence which cannot be discounted.
Dad passed away at far too early an age. He had turned 50 in March, and on April 19—a date historians will easily remember for the Battles of Lexington and Concord—he suffered a fatal heart attack. I was in college at the time, senior year, learning another craft—journalism—and it was a pretty tough week.
I got the revolver back, along with his Model 94 Winchester in .32 Special. The rifle went to my younger brother, and I kept the H&R. It has become an heirloom of sorts, and a few years ago, I passed it on to my younger son on his birthday with the remark, “Your grandpa would want you to have this.”
I was probably born in the wrong century to pay so much attention to a skill and an interest upon which so many seem to frown.
A lot of birthdays have passed since that morning I opened the shoe box and found the holstered .22-caliber H&R revolver. A lot of lead has gone downrange, there’s been plenty of gunsmoke in the air I was breathing, and I’ve had some pretty good meals with wild game. I’ve lived in two millennia, two centuries and seven decades, and I never once shot my eye out with a BB gun!
And this is Christmas Eve, a proper time to think about that day so long ago when a plain shoe box held what perhaps was a key to a lifetime which has seen me hunt in several states, bring home some dandy trophies (none of which I have ever mounted, but I still have the antlers!).
Seasons greetings to my readers. Merry Christmas. Stay safe and shoot straight!
