When Steve Bartlett was just a kid, he used to pack a lunch and take his gun to the quarries nearby. He’d spend all afternoon unloading rounds into a tin can, the bangs and pings echoing off limestone.
“It’s called plinking,” Bartlett said. “And back then, that’s just what you did.”
The next morning, 7-year-old Bartlett would take his 22 mm rifle and a box of ammunition to school. The teacher told the boys to put their guns in the clip closet, and everybody went about their day.
“After school we’d go to these big trash piles out back,” Bartlett said. “We’d shoot at rats and dig for treasure.”
Today Bartlett and his wife Kim own Precision Shooting Range. It’s a far cry from piles of garbage or tin cans and isn’t even a year old yet.
“I’m a range owner, not a politician,” Bartlett said. “But I believe people should have the choice to carry concealed and have something in the home to protect them.”
The debate over gun control is a hot issue across the country.
Early in January, President Obama announced executive action on gun control. Indiana Rep. Jim Lucas, R-Seymour, introduced two gun bills in response.
House Bill 1055 would allow people to carry firearms on state property, including universities. The second bill, HB 1056, would allow Hoosiers to carry a weapon concealed or otherwise without a permit. Currently, the bills are in their first readings in the Committee on Public Policy.
On a Saturday afternoon, the Bartletts’ range is packed with people exercising their Second Amendment right loudly and with several rapid bangs.
In a building up the hill, about 40 women packed into a room, purses on the tables, guns at the hip.
The Well Armed Women shooting chapter for Monroe County was having its monthly meeting.
Grandmas, mothers, wives and sisters listened to a police officer talk about gun safety and the law.
Is it illegal to bring your gun on property that has a sign posted, “no firearms allowed,” the officer repeated an often-asked question. Not illegal, but you could be in trouble for trespassing if they ask you to leave and you stay. Keep your purse with you. Keep your keys in your hand so you have something to fight back with.
Diane Brinson is a mother of five. She didn’t grow up shooting or hunting, but her father had firearms. Now her husband hunts and teaches hunting safety with the Department of Natural Resources.
It was pretty common for lots of families to have guns, she said. It was fine because firearms were respected.
“You learned to use them, to respect them properly, to take care of them — the good and the bad of the tool,” she said. “People aren’t instructed that way anymore, and so it’s either for violence or for their own reasons.”
The purpose of TWAW organization is to educate women on firearms and gun safety and empower them by teaching them how to shoot.
Brinson said she thinks protecting the Second Amendment is important because it’s a freedom.
“Sometimes the people who want to take that freedom away want to keep some of their other freedoms,” she said. “It’s definitely important because once you take stuff away, it’s hard to get it back.”
Inside Matt Barthold’s shop on State Road 45, a faux bald eagle sits perched on a log, wings spread.
His shops, Bloomington Home & Personal Security Store and Sergeants Police, Fire, EMS, is full of guns and quotes.
A veteran of the Marine Corps and a marksmen instructor, Barthold knows his weapons. He said most of the fuss about gun control is unwarranted — most people use them for recreation and collection.
He motions around the room; silver and black steel, bullets and magazines are spread everywhere. He says he could throw any of the guns, fully loaded, and they aren’t going to go off. A person has to pull the trigger.
That’s why the government administers background checks, he said. That’s why there is training and a permit.
He thinks people would be safer if they could carry on state-owned property.
The shooters know nobody else is going to have a gun, Barthold said. If carrying was allowed, a gunman might think twice.
“You’re stopping something from possibly happening,” he said.
