'Old Pot'

by AaronB, Friday, February 08, 2013, 10:36 (4309 days ago) @ Tom Richardson

When my dad was a kid, the only guns in the house were a .22 bolt action and a single-shot 12-gauge. They called the shotgun "Old Pot," because it killed a lot of the game that went into the pot for supper. I think it was an H&R Topper.

My grandfather (who never threw away anything) would one day disassemble Old Pot rapidly in the side yard while shooting reloads he'd found in the trash at Fort Ritchie. We later determined that a squib load had left a wad about halfway down the bore, and the next shot took the old single-shot apart. Luckily all he suffered from it was a few pieces of shot and some wood splinters in his left forearm.

Pappy used words that afternoon that my older cousin Dan didn't realize that Pappy knew. Everybody there learned a lesson that day about understanding the provenance of one's ammunition.

-AaronB