Blast From the Past

From a Rob Reed post last year, and I dunno how I missed it at the time, comes this TeeWee news program story on Gunsite, back in the early days of 1979.


Gunsite was three years old at the time. This is to the modern martial art of pistol shooting what Henry Ford's factory floor was to the automobile industry; things have changed some since then, but so much of what we take for granted these days started right there.

The Four Rules that everybody chants when they excommunicate someone from the Church of Safety? First painted on a sign there by a much younger Clint Smith. Four-count draw strokes, the Weaver stance, failure drills... All Gunsite. The very concept of average earth people, to use Pat Rogers' term, having access to quality self-defense-focused, realistic-as-possible pistol training originated right there at Gunsite.

In my early days in the gun business, I eagerly devoured Cooper's back page columns in Guns & Ammo. First thing I turned to when I got the magazine in my hands.

"Oh, I shoot competition; I'm not a 'Tactical Timmy'..." Yeah, well, Cooper helped start your game, too.

So watch and enjoy the video and dig all the people wearing foam-front trucker hats non-ironically.
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