Memories of the old days

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I was reading through an old thread that was resurrected today and there was a post by Jim Fisher where he mentions a gun lettered as being shipped to Smith Brothers Gun Shop in Rochester, PA. in 1947. This brought back a ton of old memories as this was the first gun store I was ever in. To my young eyes it was the coolest place in the world to be. A quick story; I used to ride my horse 5 days a week with an 85 year old gent that taught me more than I can ever share. Anyway I was about 14 and we were riding in the vicinity of Smith Brothers and I wanted to stop in for some .22 shells. I walked into the place and the rowels of my spurs went to singing as I walked across the old wood floor just like in the old cowboy movies. All eyes turned toward me and I was embarrassed and proud all at the same time. And as always the owner Lowrey Smith took care of me and never made me feel like the dumb kid that I was. Been a long time since I thought about that day. Miss the store...miss my horse more.
 
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It's a strange story but it does involve guns. My sister decided that she wanted to ride horses. No internal combustion meant no interest for me. After about a year of paying for her to ride at a local "stable" the folks decided that it would be cheaper to own a horse. Not really but anyway.....Dad calls an old guy that he thought would know something about horses. Turned out he still had a horse and rode most every day. So he finds us this half broke half Arab gelding and it begins. About the second or third time out with my sister riding her horse the horse dumps her off and she breaks her wrist. Elias (the old guy) says that the horse needs ridden daily to stay broke so i'm pressed into service against my will. Now the only thing I had going for me was a tremendous respect for my elders and this guy had stories about teaming horses and such as he has lived through the change from horses to the automobile. So after 8 weeks of riding I gave my sister the $500 we had paid for the horse and told her to buy her own horse. This one was mine. And so it began.
 
Now for the gun part of the story. After I got some saddle time and was pretty comfortable with my horse Elias started telling me that I could probably do most of the "stunts" that were popular in the westerns on TV at the time. So I learned the flying mount from the back of the horse, riding standing on the saddle, and picking something up off the ground at a dead run. So next up was shooting while mounted. This necessitated carrying a .22 in a saddle scabbard and I was thrilled to get to do this. So anyway the subject of guns was always close at hand. One day Elias mentions that he has an old .22 rifle in the closet that I can have to work on as it isn't complete. A few days later he brings the gun along to the barn and gives it to me before our ride. It was an old Stevens single shot missing it's hammer among other things. After our ride I hurried home to show my new treasure to my father. Dad looked the gun over and said it looked pretty familiar as he had one just like it when he was a kid. It never worked and he used it as a toy. After a few minutes of looking it over he called me closer to look at something. There on the side of the stock in pencil was his name. Turned out it was his old toy. He and Elias's sons used to play together as kids and it either got traded or left behind. It's now the least valuable most valuable gun I have.
 
As I mentioned before I was blessed with great respect for my elders. Riding along on horseback gave ample time for conversation or in my case listening to stories of the old days. Elias was a true horseman, Having teamed horses for a living for a good many years. His family owned a business called Excelsior Flour and Feed that was located next to the railroad tracks in our small town. Of course they had their own siding for unloading boxcars of grain and etc. In those days when the train uncoupled from the railcar the car was then pulled onto the siding with a team of horses. According to Elias it was no problem for a good team and for him a good team meant being able to throw the lines over his shoulder and work the team on voice commands leaving his hands free to hook and unhook the team. Needless to say after a few months my horse would do most anything on my command. Now you don't spend much time around horses without developing a healthy respect for them and understanding their boundaries. The two biggest mistakes you can make are surprising them or being about 4' directly behind them and combining the two can be a painful lesson. So after many discussions about old movies and cowboys the time comes when I just have to try the flying mount. Now I have the utmost in faith in my horse but I also know he has a great sense of humor and has no trouble getting a bit too close to a tree and brushing me off the saddle if I'm not paying enough attention. So I'm really hoping he's in a good mood on this particular day because there's definitely a point of no return when you come to running up on your horse directly from the rear. So I make a few half speed trial runs with Elias holding the reins to get him used to the idea and to make sure he's not going to do a side step or two and let me ricochet off his rump and land face first in the field. Well the first try we nailed it and I felt just like a movie cowboy. I thought it was the coolest thing ever. There was no doubt that Elias was reliving his youth through me but I was enjoying every minute of it.
 
Well I mentioned that Rebel (my horse) was a pro at knowing when I wasn't paying enough attention. He had no problem with skinning me off against a tree and then stopping and looking back at me laying on the trail with that "you got what you deserved" look. So one day as we were riding across a field something spooked him and he took a massive jump to the left. That left me without a horse under my butt. Now I always had the Amish leather shop make up my reins so that when I was holding them together in my hand they ran down his shoulder to his fetlock. That way the were long enough to give him a swat on the rump to get his attention or to tie him up if we wanted to take a break. Anyway I hit the ground flat on my back and the reins were sliding through my fingers at a rapid rate as Rebel was heading for parts unknown. I didn't want to waste time chasing him down so I clamped down on the reins as hard as I could. Well the next lunge he hit the end of the reins and twirled around and reared up at the same time. Looking up all I saw were two shiny steel shoes coming right for my face. I reached up and spread his front legs and his hooves came down on each side of my head. I used the few seconds that he was kind of shocked to roll out from beneath him and climb back in the saddle. At the time it happened so fast that I didn't really realize how close I came to dead and at around 14 years of age that stuff just sort of rolls off you. Years later it's kind of sobering.
 
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These are fantastic stories and you tell them very well! Please make sure that you are also keeping these tales collected somewhere and not simply posted here and nowhere else. These will be treasured by your family for decades going forward.

And keep on with the stories, we're all listening!
 
By the time I turned 15 I had 3+ years of riding 4-5 days a week so I was a pretty decent horseman by then. So Elias figures we should trailer the horses up north to an area he used to ride with some buddies now deceased. So he calls the guy he knew with some hunting cabins that were vacant all summer to see if we could stay there. Turns out he had passed about 5 years back but his wife was still renting out the cabins for hunting season. When he inquired about the rate for us her reply was "oh Elias the rate's the same as always for you. $6 a night". Kind of hard to believe in this day and age. Anyway we hitch our horse trailer to Elias's truck and head north. We get there and the barn is a little rough and needs an hour or so of work to be safe and secure for our horses. We get that squared away and the horses fed and go check out our quarters. There were 5 or 6 of them on the property, all log cabins with tin ceilings inside, a bunch of bunk beds, a refrigerator and a small sink/counter with a hand pump beside the sink for indoor water. neat and clean as a pin too. Not bad for a few days stay. Well the hand pump didn't work so I grabbed a crescent wrench out of the truck and pulled the rod off the pump and checked the size of the pump leather. Now I was living in a small town and was pretty doubtful that we would find anyplace selling pump leathers. We headed for town for dinner and stopped at the local hardware store and after asking for the correct size pump leather the guy reached behind him to the first shelf and sat one on the counter. I was pretty amazed. I added a few boxes of .22LR to the order and paid the bill. This was a pretty cool place. The next day we were in the saddle by 8:00 am and hit the hills. We rode all day and even fed the horses on the trail because we were out so long. Everything looked the same to me but somehow Elias got us circled around and back to the cabin. Looking back I'm pretty sure we were riding so long because we were lost but Elias never let on. So by the time we get back Elias had pretty much over done it for an 86 year old guy so I took care of both horses and headed back to the cabin. Elias was just about out but I was a starving kid and showed no mercy. I kind of woke him up and asked about dinner. All he said was that the keys were in the truck. So this is the story of the first time I drove on public roads under age with no license. There was just nothing bad about this trip!
 
And on another note the top floor of the barn had a ton of interesting stuff hanging around. Annie, the owner told me that I could take anything I wanted for my work fixing up the stalls and the pump. Not really anything of great value but I picked up an old draw knife, a singletree, an old cowbell, a cleaver, a meat saw, and a tool for measuring the iron band for a wagon wheel. The cool thing is that when I got home I cleaned this stuff up and we hung it all on the dining room wall. It all hung there until Dad passed 4 years ago. I still have all these items and they bring back some great memories.
 
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Thanks for the kind words about my recollections. I just don't understand how they got to be so long ago. Anyway my mentor Elias had a cousin named Abe. I spent a ton of time hanging out with Abe's son Jerry who was about 15 years my senior but always buying, selling, or trading something. I learned a lot from him. Some of it the hard way but those are the lessons you don't forget. Anyway Jerry was kind enough to tell me that Abe and his cronies had a bit of a bet going on about how long I would last with my half broke horse. To that end they invited me on a ride with their group. One of the guys, Jack had some $ and some pretty high dollar horses. Anyway I ride over to Abe's barn and we load the horses in his truck. It was a Chevy half ton truck with home made wooden "racks" on the back and a wood ramp bolted to the tailgate. Anyway we arrive and hit the trails and Jack and his daughter are riding some pretty high strung horses. I think they were working harder than the horses were. So I'm riding along next to last watching these pros fight with their horses constantly. Twice they couldn't make their horses climb small banks to stay on the trail so I rode around them and then their horses followed mine. So about 3/4 of the way through the ride we come to a shallow little stream crossing and Jack's horse stops in the middle and won't move. As he's yelling at his horse it just lays down in the stream dumping him off and making him scramble to keep his leg from getting caught. Well after that the focus was off me and Jack got ribbed pretty good for the behavior of his old nag. When we got back and I went to load my horse he suddenly got a notion that he wasn't going into the truck. I used my long reins to give him a couple of slaps on the side and he walked right up the ramp. That right there was the end of any talk or doubt about me or my horse. I was pretty proud of my horse that day and realized that price has nothing to do with value.
 
Good stories . Made me do some remembering about my great uncle who put up with me when I was a kid. Thanks.
 
I was needing a riding horse

My father in law made his living
logging with horses before
WW2 he was telling me a story
about a smart (donkey) on a iron
wheel tractor trying to hook on to his
Team he got lucky and hooked on
To a chain Donnie was dragging.
Donnie said that's when the fun
started he drug the smart(donkey)
to the bottom of the hollow and upset
Him this story started with the line
I was needed a riding horse
 
Along time back I hunted with a fine bunch of guys in Eastern Idaho. As I was no horse rider they gave be their kids horse, Duffer, to ride. Old Duffer was a gelding & getting some age on him. We rode up to the Montana line. As we all had deer & elk tags we were just looking for game. Duffer had a bad habit of throwing his head so knocked my Stetson off going up the mountain. Broke some rattlesnake rattles I had on the band. I retrieved the hat & kicked old Duffer in the chinch. He was a pretty good horse after that. Gosh, come to think about it, it was in the '50's. We took 2 Elk off that mountain later on.
 
When you mentioned the name,Rebel, brought a tear as our last horse was also Rebel. My barber ran standard breds at Freehold and as a two year old he just wasn't cutting it. Runnin Rebel. He offered him to me and since it was me or the meat men I took him. He hung around for 18 years, nothing but a big pet. Still have the two Huge Confederate flags that hung in the stable.
 
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