Your Mothers Day Favorite Deer Rifle Story

[Michiganhunter]

What's your mothers favorite rifle?

My mothers favorite was a Stevens bolt action 30-30 with iron sights. It was the only rifle she ever used.

My mother didn't start using a rifle until she was 70 years old. She only wanted to learn to shoot after a particularly barren deer hunting season for my dad and my brothers and I.
While we were hunting the rest of our farm, mom was either sitting at her sewing machine or doing all the other chores she did each day and watching deer foraging for leftovers in her garden while we hunting and not seeing anything. She was a little frustrated with that.

She needed at least 4 deer a year to freeze and can in those Mason jars.
Whenever her children and grandchildren came to visit her at the farm she would always give them a "care package" to take home with them. This consisted of various canned vegetables, fruit, soups and deer. When someone was ready to leave, there would be a box sitting on top of the chest freezer by the back door. You didn't dare tell her it wasn't necessary, you just picked it up and put it in your car. Inside that box would always be a note reminding us to bring back those empty Mason jars.

So this one year we were not producing any meat for her care packages. She wasn't happy. My youngest brother was the best shot in the family so mom told him, she didn't ask, to teach her how to shoot. I wasn't there to watch but my brother told us when she shot, the recoil jerked her head and shoulder back violently. He asked her if she was okay and she just said "why"? As if nothing had happened.He told us it was difficult to watch as she shot.
She learned how to shoot and a couple days later she saw a doe in the garden, she opened the sliding glass window, rested the rifle on the sewing machine and shot it about 50 yards away. We used to joke that she was the only person in the history of hunting to use a sewing machine as a rest. When we came in for lunch that day she told us to leave our jackets and boots on and go get the deer. It was the same tone as asking us to go get the mail.She wasn't excited, just a matter of fact statement. With my dad and moms generation, bragging was as rude as talking back to your elders or missing church on Sunday just to go hunting. It just wasn't done.
 For the remainder of her life she would hunt from the house and even spent a few mornings and afternoons at the hunting shack my dad used about a hundred yards from the house. She shot more deer throughout the years but that first deer has been indelibly etched in the minds of my brothers and I.

So, on this Mother's Day, I can't help but think about that 30-30 and my mom and that deer some 50 odd years ago.

[zonie]

Remington 721 in 270 Winchester,  she was a very good shot mostly deer and elk.  the rifle is now my son's.  The folks were children of the depression and pretty much ate everything.  Likewise the parents canned meats, fish, veggies, and really good jams.  I especially love her canned  minced meat deer, elk & beef , made into pies.   

[badsection]

LOL! My dad had a AD with a 22LR into our TV in the 1950's.  Yea, black and white with tubes that took 2 or 3 hours to "warm up" ,10" screen in a huge console!  At least it seemed so at age 7!  Zero effect on the TV, it did have a hole in the screen. That was my mom's favorite gun!   

[musicman]

I cannot remember my Mother ever shooting, unless Dad got her to, in their early years.  But my Mother was always proud of us hunting and shooting, and always cooked everything we would bring in.  Her family were rural farmers like my Dad's family, but they were not into the "going out and making a day of shooting or hunting thing."  Her Dad and brothers brought in the occasional rabbits and squirrels, maybe a duck now and then and that was that.  My Dad's side lived to hunt and fish, and everyone in the community knew it.  One story I would hear Mother tell people, with a lot of pride, was when she announced to her Dad that my Dad had proposed to her, my Grandfather said, "Well, at least I know you won't go hungry.  As soon as those Lehmann boys can walk, they have a fishing pole in one hand, and a gun in the other."  I almost have a tear in my eye sharing this with y'all.  I have raised my kids like that, and hopefully they will do the same with theirs.  MM

[PARA45]

Nice story MM.