"Ya feel lucky punk?" Selling testosterone guns

Shooting Industry, May, 1999 by Massad Ayoob

The aforementioned American Derringer Corp. makes a single shot in .45/70. I shot one in a Reno gunshop that had a sign up next to it on the rental counter: "First shot, $5.00. Second shot free, ha ha." I experienced an attack of testosterone overdose and asked if I got my five bucks back after the third shot.

It was not my finest hour. The recoil of the first shot took the gun right out of my hand, the only time that's happened in my life. I now understood why they didn't make it with a second barrel. I tightened down for the next two and won the bet, but my right hand didn't forgive me until a couple of weeks later when the sore redness finally left the palm.

Caveats: Be sure to remind the customer how to hold a very powerful gun. The really bad kickers can cause injury. Someone with a partially detached retina could exacerbate the eye injury shooting a 10 gauge or an elephant rifle from the shoulder. A friend of mine, who used to chamber XP-100 pistols for full-power .458 Winchester Magnums, told me he suffered a permanent arm injury when he fired it with a locked elbow and the recoil "jammed the joint." Make sure the customer knows enough not to hand such a gun to a new shooter or a kid.

Treated wisely and safely, the biggest guns are fun. They give the shooter a sense of pride and accomplishment, and sometimes, a sense of challenge. But, if you don't have one on display, it probably won't occur to the customer to buy one.