I do remember Lytles' Sporting Goods on the square. I could wander for hours just reading about the Winchesters on the walls. Sadly, the fire took them all.This is kind of a side bar but relevant to the current conversation. How many of y’all remember the window of production in the gun world when it was dang near impossible to go buy a new gun that was both accurate and reliable out of the box? All the big houses in handguns and rifles kept a slew of smiths fed and their chilluns out of the weather. My smith I grew up with, may he rest in peace, was closer to me than about three fourths of my family. His passing left a huge hole in my world. I’d give anything to be able to spend a week with him in todays gun world. It would blow his mind that I could take a thousand dollars or less and put a rig together that would tear up a challenge plate at a grand. That used to be the holy grail. Now I have friends working on a mile with a dang .22 rimfire. I guess there’s a reason I can spend days in the Cowboy Hall of Fame, Woolarock, JM Davis or the Cabelas Gun library before they got woke by a bass boat. I don’t want to create a significant disturbance for the gentleman, but if you’re ever in Enid it’s magical visiting Msr. Perodeau’s establishment. He’s got some serious bundukis loitering about the place.
I guess there’s no sense throwing out the baby if the waters still warm. Old guns fascinate me even though new ones can often run them a lap. New ones still need a little of that old charm no matter if they do shoot lights out. See, I tole ya I can do a tangent!
Old George Dobravloney at Bison Shooter's Supply was my Swami. Many's a time he'd let me clip dandelions with a Thompson. That was before the robbery.