Friday Mornings, Old Men and Coffee

The discussion had been about cannon, particularly, a Civil War cannon a local resident had in their front yard in a neighborhood nearby. After a somewhat heated discussion of the cannon’s technical details, the conversation had reached a lull, but the silence was broken when the former city councilman spoke.

“We saw a cannon in an attic once,” Frank said, rescuing us from our momentary daydreams. 

“Oh, yeah?” I said taking another slurp of coffee.

It was the weekly meeting of out kitchen cabinet. Presidents had cabinets, why not us? There were five of us ranging in age from seventy-one to ninety-three. We have met at our senior member’s house since the unfortunate demise of his Lincoln automobile in a traffic accident. Conversation covered a myriad of topics, some of which were discussed quite intensely. 

The speaker took a drink of his coffee, cleared his throat, and continued, “It was several years ago now when my wife and I volunteered at the Charleston Annual Home Show to be, huh…what do you call it when you show people around?”

“Docent?”

“Tour guide?”

“Tour guides. That’s what we were? We would show people around when they visited the house. We thought we would go early and get a preview of what we were to show people, and maybe we could see the caretaker. The owner of this South Battery house, like quite a few of the others, lived out of town. Actually, he owned several houses,” the retired civil engineer continued his story. 

“When Joe Riley was mayor he sold rich Yankees on the idea they could own a historic antebellum house in Charleston if they would simply restore it. South of Broad Street went from a near slum to a destination for readers of Travel+Leisure  magazine,” I added.

He continued, slightly perturbed by my interruption, “We did arrive early and found the caretaker. He was very helpful and showed us around and described things in that distinct Charleston accent.  It was either a three or four story house. I don’t remember. It was years ago. I don’t remember if it was the top floor or the attic. But it was probably the top floor since most of the houses near White Point Gardens have relatively flat roofs… It was the top floor. I remember now, because the caretaker unlocked the door to enter a small room. It was obviously not lived-in and probably used for storage. The object in the middle of the room immediately caught my eye.” The speaker paused, took a bite of the pumpkin bread in front of him and followed it with a gulp of coffee. He deftly brushed the crumbs from the corners of his mouth before continuing. 

“Right in the middle of the room was a cannon. Just the barrel, mind you. It must have been seven or eight feet long. I couldn’t believe it. It must have weighed half a ton. I couldn’t imagine why anyone would have a cannon in their house. How would they have gotten it up the stairs?” the former member of the Army Corps of Engineers continued.

“How did they get it up the stairs?” our host wanted to know.

“What about the stairs?” the retired lineman from Boston asked. Occasionally Louie did not hear everything that was said, particularly when the battery was dying in his hearing aid. 

“They didn’t carry the cannon up the stairs,”.  Frank took a deep breath. He let it out slowly.  He took another sip of his coffee, then held the styrofoam cup up indicating to me that he need it refilled.

“Whaddya mean?” Roy, the most rotund of the older men, asked.

“Just a minute! Let Joe get back to the table with my coffee,” Frank said, forking another piece of the pumpkin bread. 

I returned to the table with a steaming cup of coffee for Frank. Frank took a swallow of the steaming hot coffee without flinching. 

“Thanks, Joe. No, it came through the roof!” the engineer said smacking, the table with his hand. 

“Through the roof?” The three said in unison. 

“I think it was about 1865 when Union forces were occupying Charleston. The Confederates by that time were pretty thoroughly beaten, but they were intent on sabotaging all cannons to insure that the North couldn’t use them.  It’s what is known as spiking. You fill the cannon with gunpowder to blow it apart. But, in the case of this cannon, something went wrong. The cannon was blown up in the air and fell through the roof of the house. It’s been there ever since.”

“Well, my Confederate ancestors were successful in one way,” I said.

“How’s that?” Frank wanted to know. 

I kind of smiled and said, “He did keep the Yankees from using that cannon!”

And then the conversation turned to local politics. 

__________________________________________________

photo courtesy of Google Maps

The recent publicity about the mass shootings prompted me to write this post. 

We were riding across a field having checked out my brother-in-law's deer feeder. He had been having trouble with raccoons stealing deer corn. 

"You take any deer with your Henry this year?" I asked.  I knew he had just traded his old Marlin lever action in on the Henry lever action rifle.

"I got two," he said with a grin as the Gator hit another bump. I had my hand on the grab bar as the little ATV carried us back to house he had personally designed for himself and my sister. 

"Got one of those assault rifles?" I asked thinking of the recent shootings in El Paso and Dayton. 

"No-o-o! Carried a M-16 in Nam. That was the last time I had one of those assault rifles. My Henry does everything I need in a  rifle.  I don't know why anybody would want one, but lotta guys buy 'em." 

I too am a veteran of the Vietnam War and qualified with a M-16 too. I grew up on a farm and have never owned a rifle though. Daddy always said they were too dangerous. He said the bullets went too far. I did have a shotgun when I was eight years old though. As I gave more thought to recent events I decided to research gun ownership a bit further.

Are there more mass shootings than ever before? The answer to this question depends on the definition of mass shooting. there are several definitions. Most data indicate there is not an increase.  However, in today's print and electronic purveyors of news you would think so. The media tends to overly report these events. The competition among media outlets is such that the truth sometimes becomes irrelevant. We must always remember that news media are profit making identities. Therefore  I have sought to get most of my data from government agencies. 

I continued to interview people. I decided that I would talk to friends of mine who were gun owners. And I would talk to some folks that didn't own guns. Let me say that the guys I talked with were not old guys like me. Some responded quickly with, " Why do we need regulation anyway? Criminals will always have guns! Why shouldn't I have a gun to protect myself and what if the government tries to take my stuff!" 

I was talking to a young man on the west coast.  I was curious about why he owned a AR-15. For protection he said.  “But what about the police force?” I asked.

He responded with, “Do you know how many times an assailant can shoot me by the time the cops would get to me?” I had to admit I did not have an answer. 

Then I asked,“ What about thirty round capacity magazines? Wouldn’t a ten round magazine reduce the firepower of the mass shooters?”

“And it would also reduce my ability to defend myself. While I’m changing magazines I could be shot!”

I talked with another friend on the West Coast who was a member of a club who joined to gather to manufacture their own M-16 receivers. The receiver is the part of the gun which determines the action in his case a fully automatic M-16.  Since such receivers would have no serial numbers they would be untraceable. I asked why. He said, “ It’s all about the Second Amendment which gives me the right to hold and bear arms. If the government becomes too powerful and infringes on my individual rights, I can defend myself. I’m investing in bullets and beans. I’ve got survival foods and converted some of my assets to gold. I am ready for the next revolution.”

I did find a couple of people that agreed that smaller magazines was probably be a good idea. Most agree with better background checks but the hard core said we had too much checking now.  Everyone agreed that mentally unstable and convicted felons should not allowed to buy  guns.  

During this time I viewed Ben Shapiro’s interview Piers Morgan. Morgan of course believes that the government should confiscate the public’s guns. He cites examples in the UK where this has been done with marked decrease in gun crime. However, there was a marked increase in knife crime.  Another note on a Piers Morgan interview while he was employed by CNN.  After the Sandy Hook School shooting Morgan was interviewing various celebrities. With filmmaker Michael Moore at his side he called the actor, L.L. Cool J, on the west coast for his reaction.  The star of NCIS Las Angeles was quick to say he was a gun owner in case he needed to protect himself from an oppressive government. The surprised Morgan had no comment. 

• What’s my idea after my research. Well my opinion hasn’t changed much. 
• I think extensive background checks are a good idea. 
• A waiting time for the delivery of the gun to a customer should be in days or months rather than hours. 
• I think limiting magazine size to ten rounds is a good idea although when I was younger a .22 caliber semi-automatic held 22 cartridges in a tubular magazine. 
• Reducing the possibility of the mentally deranged obtaining guns is good idea. Once the mentally handicapped were incarcerated and kept away from the public.  But then it was decided that this was inhumane and many less severe 
• cases were released and allowed to self medicate. 
• Magazine size on so-called assault shotguns should be reduced also. There should be some mandatory gun operation and safety instruction at the point of purchase. 

My observations:  Are assault rifles with high capacity magazines the problem? I don’t think so. In 1966 Charles Whitman killed 14 people shooting from the tower on the University of Texas campus with a deer rifle. Timothy McVeigh killed 168 people with a bomb in Oklahoma city. 

Gun laws are for people who obey the law. Criminals will always have guns. Government is not the solution. Look what they’ve done with rail passenger service, mail service, veterans medical care, and education. There are no success stories here. Until the people in Washington really care about the people they represent nothing will change.