Need your lawful-carry-of-guns-in-school stories from the old days

Clifton High School,
Bosque County, Texas


Year Graduated: 1983

It was most common for many of the boys to carry firearms in their vehicles. No curriculum for shooting. We just had guns. Many hunted in the evenings and weekends and theft was nonexistant in a small town so everyone left their guns in their vehicles all the time.

I could usually be found to have one shotgun and one centerfire rifle (30-30 or 300 Savage) at all times.

No one ever had a gun stolen or used one to kill another human being.
 
Heres a recent one for you. I graduated from St. Mark's in Dallas in 01, and the year before that (so 99 or 00), 2 seniors did a big presentation about them hunting. They brought in a couple of shotguns a piece, and video of them shooting at clay pigeons. They did the presentation in front of the whole highschool, and it didn't seem like that big a deal to me. I'm sure they cleared it with the head of school first though.
 
Went to a boarding school (DeVeaux School, Niagara Falls, NY) '68-'71. Kept my 20ga with the headmaster. Would go get it for hunting or shooting skeet/trap. No big deal. Heck, the shooting club, guns and all, had a pic taken right on campus for the yearbook. Geez.... and there wasn't a cop around.
 
Guns in School

In the late 60's early 70's I always had either my .22 Winchester or a Winchester pump shotgun in the trunk of my car for after school shooting activities, small game season, woodchuck season, crow season, dove season and just plain old plinkin season. ;)
When I was in the 7th grade I had to give a speech and presentation for English class, First one was on the use and safe handling of a rifle, took the old .22 with ammo into school no questions ask!
Also did one on Archery, Had an old Bear recurve with some target arrows and broadheads, again no questions ask. :)
Doing things like that back then was a common everyday occurance! :cool: I never went anywhere without that old .22! ;)
 
Edgewood Elementary School....

Anderson, Indiana, 1961. My friend had an old percussion target rifle he brought to school for a history presentation. I brought an original powder horn for that one, then decided to do my own presentation with my 1889 Springfield trapdoor and the Indian Wars. As I carried the rifle down the hall I met another student with an 1873 Trapdoor heading for class...he had the same idea as me, so we made the presentation together. It really was a different attitude then:)
 
Southern Idaho, Caldwell High School. 1965-67, it was nothing out of the ordinary to go duck hunting before school and pheasant hunting after school, so we regularly had our shotguns in our rigs! Would even slide in with our waders on if running late.
:)
 
Guns, pocket knives and deadly rubber bands

I just read this thread between two acquaintances today... John followed by Jeff's response:

Instructive
On Jul 18, 2004, John wrote:

>>> Uh, don't ask how or why a 5 year old got expelled in first grade. Ah well, I'll go ahead and tell ya - I got caught with a knife and cut a kid's finger who grabbed for it. It was a butter knife that I used to carve Playdoh with, and I had it in a paperbag with my Playdoh to take with me to my babysitter's after school. A little friend looked inside, saw the butter knife and started screaming "he's got a knife!" (Hey, that was what, 1962??) and I was expelled.

John<<<

----------------------------------------

Now that one is completely amazing to me.

In 1964, I was (briefly) in the American (US Army) grade school in southern Germany. At that time, many of the boys were heavily into stick and tissue rubber band powered airplanes. We also found that the rubber strands used to power them were EXCELLENT for snapping ants (evidently, kids have been at war with ants all over the world, even today). BTW, the kids in the German schools also "did" the airplanes and snapped ants, I found out four months later.

In any event, we carried such rubber bands to school and had "group snappings" (of ants, not of each other). I don't recall the circumstances, but the principle grabbed me one day and had me turn out my pockets. I had THREE pocket knives (Lord knows why) AND one 18" section of "Assault Rubber."

The idiot proceeded to grill me about the "use" of the rubber, then showed me how (in the guise of a question) how one might make a finger slingshot and shoot a paper clip into someone else's eye(s). Ultimately, he took the rubber band, but made no comment or action about the (3) pocket knives.

Over the years, I've thought about the astounding stupidity of his actions. Granted, the boys almost certainly would have discovered the mischief potential for the rubber bands on our own, but for that moron to stand there and give us a BLUEPRINT........

Prior to arriving in Germany, I carried my little Win target rifle to school every Thursday, so we could go shoot on the Jr rifle team after school (Ft. Huachuca). Fortunately, (evidently) the rifles in those days didn't give off the evil "gun rays" and none of us ever went berserk with our rifles.

"Jeff"
Arizona
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I know a deputy sheriff who says that when he was growing up his father had him stop by the hardware store and bring home a case of dynamite on the school bus. Can you imagine that happeing today?
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You'd have to find dynamite at the hardware store first. I don't think Lowe's carries the stuff. :eek:

On a more thread related note, I took outdoor education in high school. First semester was fishing and aquatic stuff, the second was hunting and trapping and stuff. When the gym class was doing archery, we did that, and did the long range stuff where you angle it way up. That was fun. We went to a nearby wildlife preserve where we did shooting, .22s from the range, and the teacher(also the football coach, if I recall correctly) brought in a 20 guage to shoot trap. My first time, got two out of ten shots from right behind the house.

In fourth grade, we had a reenacter come in and show off a civil war preproduction as part of the unit on that era. They didn't have a problem with that. As a matter of fact, I recall that the code of conduct said something to the effect that muzzleloaders could be brought in by certain approved people for such things. I can't remember where the cutoff was, but that was interesting.

I wish we'd had a shooting team of some sort. I'd have been all over it. Let's see here, graduated in '01, that makes the outdoor ed class '00 and '01, and fourth grade would be '93. St. Charles, which is a largish town, I can't recall the population off the top of my head.
 
Just got these from THR

From Sistema:
Back in the unenlightened dark ages when I was in High School the unofficial "uniform" of most of the male students included a Buck Folder in a leather belt sheath.

Of course, I could always walk into the ROTC arms room and check out my M14 (with "da switch") for cleaning, drill, etc., or I could check out a Remington .22 match rifle for use on the 50 ft. indoor range.

Additionally, most of us had firearms in our vehicles, either in the trunk or, if in a pickup, in a gunrack in the rear window. There were few days when I didn't have either a .22 rifle or a 12 gauge shotgun in my trunk, either to bust a few targets, a covey of quail, or a round of skeet after school.

I may have missed something, or it may be faulty memory, but I don't remember either myself or any of my classmates deciding to perforate our fellow students or teachers with our knives or firearms. Maybe these implements weren't as dangerous in those days? (Or, maybe the whole dang nation has gone PC nutzoid!)
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From Brad:
It would probably short-circuit some liberal's neural network to know that I used to regularly take a shotgun to the principal's office in my high school. They would lock it in the office supply closet for safekeeping until school was out. And my old Sweet Sixteen usually had a few friends from other students who were doing the same thing.

Of course, I grew up in the heart of Michael Moore's self-labeled "Jesus Land" where ethics and personal responsibility were a part of life and not just something to talk about on TV (which my parents would regularly switch off if there was something they didn't think I should watch - and it stayed off, too).

Sick, twisted me for growing up in such a backwards place.

Brad
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Highland Avenue Elementry--New Castle,Pa. 1959---1963. We're about 50 miles north of Pittsburgh. It used to be very common for the boys to bring in their Dad's fire-arms for show and tell.

Of course this evolved into taking the guns to high-school,(securing them with the teacher), for hunting at the end of the day. When we were unable to catch a ride with friends, we regularly rode the city buses to the end of the line to go small game hunting.(1968-1969).

Times sure have changed... :(
 
How times have changed eh?

I went to St. Mary's HS when it was in downtown Phoenix. During Rodeo week in '71 we actually held a 'shoot-out' on campus grounds, blanks of course. There was a home movie of this; I'll check and see if I can locate the classmate.
 
Back in 1956 when I was 13 years old, we used to have, 'Show 'n Tell' Fridays. Whatever interested you, or was used for your favorite hobby could be brought into class. I, still, remember Eugene Scorcelli riding on the school bus holding his father's 16 gauge Ithaca shotgun - inside a thin gun case, muzzle pointing at the ceiling.

50 or 60 kids didn't even blink; nobody thought anything special of it. When the bus arrived at school one of the teachers took the shotgun away from Eugene and placed it into a cabinet until, 'Show 'n Tell' time when it was handed back. He explained how it worked to the class, and then passed the shotgun around the room for everyone to examine. I thought that Model 37 was a pretty neat gun; but, I wouldn't have traded my big 12 gauge Fox double for it.

At the end of the day, Eugene's father came to school and took him and the shotgun home. As far as everyone was concerned it was just another school day; and the extra consideration shown by Mr. Scorcelli was merely indicative of the fact that he was teaching his son (and the rest of us) to respect firearms and handle them carefully.

That grammar school was located in northern New Jersey, too. Can you imagine something like that happening in NJ, today? Oh, how I miss the good old days! :rolleyes:



;)
 
In the late '50's myself and several others brought rifles to grade school for show and tell type days. Layed 'em on the floor next to our desk or leaned them on the wall in the corner. We also had a Manual Arts class, which was a wood working class, and one of the projects we could choose to build was a cross bow. In highschool there was a shooting range in the basement with school supplied rifles. This all took place in St. Louis, MO. Incredible.
 
I grew up in rural IN, going to school in a county about 1/3-way south from the top and right on the IL border.

IIRC, we had a rule saying we couldn't have guns in our elementary school. I remember in 6th grade ('77-'78), a fellow who was going to be staying over with a friend brought in a long gun case - the teacher winked at him and told him to put his "skis" (it was barely autumn) in the coat closet for the day.

In Jr. High ('78-'81), the FFA boys used to bring their rifles and shotguns on the bus in the autumn. Don't know why; I wasn't in FFA. Something to do with killing crows, I think.

Many of the kids in high school ('81-'84) had shotguns in their cars. A couple of the teachers and the assistant principal had concealed carry licenses and carried. We knew. Never a problem.

When the Columbine mess happened, all I could think of is what would have happened if they'd tried that back at old Benton Central when I was growing up: kids sprinting for their trucks, teachers running out of their classrooms with their guns drawn. It woulda been like the Dalton Gang's ride out of Northfield, Minnesota back in 1876! :D As it was, though, look what happened - nice going, nanny-state idiots. :(
 
Sigh!!

Erich, It was the no account Norwegian immigrants that shot the pee-waddin out of the JAMES gang at Northfield, MN.

It was the Citizens of Coffeyville, KS who shot the pee-waddin out of the DALTON gang.

And not to quote me it was a bunch of BLACKS who did the same to Pretty Boy Floyd down in rural OK.

You shall have to determine your own punishment for your transgressions. :p
 
During all four years of high school ('82-'86), there was a .22 & 12 gauge in the back window of my brothers & my truck. We were always doing some kind of hunting or target shooting or plinking after school - no matter what the weather. Our fishing poles were also always in the truck & used all the time. We attended Kalamazoo Christian H.S. in Kalamazoo, Michigan. I would guess that half of the students there did the same as we had done. Never once had a single incident of any violence of any kind. :cool:
 
We didn't do this in Brooklyn ,nothing to hunt !! But my high school was one of a number that had a rifle team and a range in the basement. That disappeared in the late 60s in the anti gun hysteria.....But today everything is reacted to with hysteria .A recent news item - a kid brought some mercury to school , the school was evacuated ! in fact all THREE schools in the school district were evacuated !!
 
Guns in School or When We Were Trusted

In the 1950’s the son of a Police Captain would bring a shotgun to school, hide it in the bushes on school grounds and then pick it up on the way home so he could go duck hunting. This was with his father’s permission.

My brother, in the 1970, brought a 30-06 Springfield to metal shop in high school and turned the bolt, polished all the metal parts, had it blued and put it all together in a approved metal shop project. Also, my brother bought some firearms from several of the teachers at school. The teachers would call our father and get his ok.

My father, in the 1980’s, worked for the school system and bought a Luger from one of the teachers
 
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