Local gun shows

Finally, I attended a gun show! The show was held this past weekend in Big Lake. I’ve seen this show more crowded over the years, but it wasn’t bad, people numbers wise, for the time I was there.

I attended the last three hours of the show on Sunday afternoon. While that’s not a bad time if you’re looking for deals, the downside is that the inventory available when the show first opened has usually been picked over with the “better” items already sold. I wasn’t looking for anything specific, so the timing wasn’t important to me.

For the last several years, the blackpowder shooting club had three tables with an exhibit of firearms and shooting accessories on two of them. The third table was the sale table, reserved for club items (like tomahawks or memberships), and for stuff club members were looking to peddle. I’ve sold items ranging from gun hangers and old traps to both modern and “historic” firearms. This year, the club officers were out-of-state, and no member volunteered to ramrod the tables, so the club had no presence there.

Normally, if the club was “doing” the show, I would help set up the tables before the show and take them down after. During the show, I would help man the tables, answering questions and hawking my wares. I didn’t have the ability to deal with all the stuff the club usually brings to the show (like banners, pictures, gun racks, printed materials, etc.), so I didn’t volunteer. Plus, working on the show eats up your entire weekend, and I didn’t have the extra time right now.

I’ve always enjoyed attending this event. For me, this show seems to be a little more laid back than your typical gun show, and the pace is a little slower. It helps that I live in Big Lake, so I know a lot of the folks attending and getting a chance to see them and catch up on life is fun too. One couple I’ve known for over twenty years stopped to chat as we passed while making the rounds of the tables. Dan was teasing when he told me he and Judy had paid the admission charge just to see me and say “hi,” since they figured I’d be at the blackpowder table.

Normally, when I’m working the show, after arriving at the facility, I’ll go directly to the tables and help get things arranged to deal with the public when the doors open. This year, I decided to go a different route and look at items being displayed as I worked my way around the show. I went down an aisle I don’t normally get to look at and spotted a business I was hoping was still around. Alaska Shooting Specialties: Alaska Airguns, located in Houston, had a couple of tables and I talked with the owner.

This business is located maybe five miles from my house, and I was hoping they were still operating. I shoot airguns occasionally and having a business catering to that sport just down the road would greatly help with PCP airgun tank recharging and parts and repair services. If you shoot airguns or need pellets or parts, check them out. I’d rather deal locally than have to mail order from Arizona or Ohio. I’ll be visiting now that my health is improving and I can start to do stuff I’ve had to put off for years.

The next tables in line were manned by US Coast Guard Auxiliary (USCGA) folks with all kinds of boating information. I asked if they were planning to do vessel inspections around Big Lake to help educate boaters and help them learn the items they are required by law to have aboard, and was told they were planning to. Every year I’ve operated my riverboat, I’ve always had this inspection done prior to the boating season.

Since I haven’t used the boat for a couple of years, I was out of touch with current situations. The gentleman and I had a great discussion, and he finally asked if I was the guy who wrote for The Frontiersman. When I answered, “guilty as charged,” he complemented me on an article I had written maybe a dozen years ago about the vessel inspections being done and my “trials and tribulations” about not always passing on my first try.

He had done some of the inspections on my boat. I thought he looked familiar. The USCGA is a great organization and deserves your support.