Guns, Guns, Guns And Guys At Big Show
If you’ve never been to a gun show, you know what you’ve missed.
Judging from the big event at the Spokane Interstate Fairgrounds this past weekend, there’s not much about one that could qualify as a surprise.
The bumper stickers in the parking lot are the ones you would expect - “Gun control is a steady hand.”
The political movements represented at pamphlet-laden booths espouse views that don’t come as much of a shock - “Get us out of the United Nations.”
The vast majority of the people attending are men.
And if you are not passionate about firearms, it’s tempting to start thinking that after seeing a few hundred guns, you’ve seen ‘em all.
All that, a person could guess without forking over $4.50 to rub shoulders with guys dressed in camouflage. But the thing you don’t realize about a gun show until actually checking one out is how much it feels like being at a home and garden show.
Sure, high-powered rifles and boxes of ammo aren’t lawn chairs and miracle window-washing devices. But the browsing styles and interactions with the dealers are pretty similar.
“My wife would kill me if I spent this much,” mumbled a bearded guy considering the purchase of a vintage rifle Sunday afternoon.
“Well,” said the dealer standing on the other side of a table covered with weapons, “I won’t tell her.”
Two teenage boys stared at a black M-16 light machine gun. One reached over and touched the barrel with a single finger. “Mmmmmm,” he said.
His friend looked at him and spoke. “Yeah, but these things jam.”
A sign on one dealer’s table read “We cheat the other guy and pass the savings on to you.”
In addition to guns and bullets, show-goers could examine knives, buffalo jerky, jewelry, vintage coins, Elvis paintings, drawings of Mickey Mantle and Michael Jordan, T-shirts adorned with the images of wolves and bears, videos such as “Shoot to Live” and “Tactical Shotgun,” books ranging from “Know Your Czechoslovakian Pistols” to “Herbal Aphrodisiacs,” Chevy Camaro belt-buckles, dishes painted with rodeo scenes, T-shirts proclaiming “Christian American Heterosexual Pro-Gun Conservative,” and bumper stickers that announced “Driver only carries $20 worth of ammunition.”
Visa and MasterCard accepted.
But guns, big ones and small ones, were the featured attraction. And you could hear the same two things said about them over and over.
A guy would pick one up and softly express his admiration in one word: “Sweet.”
And time and again, the dealer would answer with the classic gun-show phrase: “That’s the real thing.”
, DataTimes MEMO: Being There is a weekly feature that visits Inland Northwest gatherings.