My Uncle Fred gave me the best of many gun safety and manners afield, of all the many male family members. When I was about 11, we went out to a local farm in October- my favorite month- with both my Stevens Walnut Hill .22LR single shot, and my Dad's Model 12 20 gauge- Fred shot a Model 97 12 gauge, but he left it at home.
He set two large pumpkins on a old apple crate in the sand pit we used for a backstop for our ,22's and the tin cans (never glass bottles) we used for plinking--and target practice--then we went back about 20 yards to where we had set both guns, cased and unloaded- "OK- bucko- he said: when you are ready, take out your .22, and with the muzzle pointed towards the pumpkins, load it-and whenever you are ready, shoot at the center of one of the pumpkins. I did, then opened the gun and ejected the fired case- "Good, now put the gun back in the case and come with me-- We went to the pumpkin I had shot, and observed the small hole the bullet had made on the front- then he spun it around, and I saw the way larger hole made when the bullet exited- then he cut off the top with his Mahler & Grosh jack-knife, just like we would do a few weeks later for Jack-O-Lanterns at Halloween- and said- "looks like the inside of a human head, doesn't it?" So, now you know what can happen even with a .22 if you ever make a mistake in gun handling and safety--
Then we went back to the gun cases, and he had me take out Dad's 20 gauge, and with the muzzle pointed at the pumkins, he had me rack it open, drop a shell into the chamber, and close the action. Again, he had me point the muzzle at the second pumpkin, and told me to fire when I was ready. Up to then, I had only shot .22's- never a shotgun- The louder boom and recoil was a lot more than I was used to with the .22 Stevens.
The pumpkin had exploded into a mass of yellow pulp, the green stem had flown about 20 feet from the impact point. He had me unload the fired empty shell and case the M12-- then again we walked over to the pumpkins- or what was left of them-- Then he said: "Now, bucko- look long and hard, and what you see could be my head, or that of our bird dog Clancy, or your Dad's or Grandpa's, for that matter. Always remember this:- just like words you can't take back once they are spoken in anger, you can't take a shot back that you fired in haste or error. If in doubt, it is always better not to speak and not to shoot." I have lived by those words of wisdom all my life since.
Uncle Fred was my Mother's older brother, like her, college educated and a successful patent lawyer- He was more erudite than either my Dad or my Grandfather, both machinists- but all my growing life I never saw any of them ever point any gun towards another human, dog, or anything else they did not wish to shoot stone cold dead.
Uncle Fred was the living embodiment of the old adage: "Beware the man who shoots one gun, as he usually will be very good with it." He had a 12 gauge Pigeon Grade M1897 with the "Black Diamond"inlay in the straight hand stock- 28" Mod.choke- The only family gun that didn't come to me as an inheritance. Uncle Fred was a life-long bachelor, I never did find out where it ended up-but I would sure like to have it today.
