When I was a kid, Waterloo/Cedar Falls Iowa had several independent sporting goods stores. A couple specialized in golf clubs, ball gloves, football helmets, etc. Others in fishing tackle, bait, and guns. One of them had a sign advertising "500 guns!" A kid in my high school class got a job there. He neither hunted nor fished. We speculated that his job was likely counting worms and minnows when someone came in to buy bait.
Now there's one big Scheels and a Dick's which cover everything.
Of course if you lived in a big city like New York back when Abercrombie and Fitch carried a wide variety of guns and other shooting and hunting gear, you were also pretty darned lucky.
