It's been years since I have been to a gun show. First it was Covid shutting everything down and then it was a Governor who decided that gun shows should no longer be allowed in state buildings. Something about not being family friendly events. I guess I must not have raised my children right because gun shows were family friendly events for my family.
Today my wife and I decided to go to a gun show held in a nearby city. It was promoted as part of the Annual Moriarty Pinto Bean Fiesta. The fiesta started out with a parade down the Main Street. Although we arrived nearly half an hour early, parking was scarce. We managed to find a place to park and then setup chairs in the shade where the breeze created much cooler conditions than on the sunny side. We met a lot of nice people and loads of candy was thrown for the kids! I suspect they gathered more candy per capita than they do for Halloween trick or treating.
After that we traveled to the Moriarty Civic Center where the gun show was. It was a very nice facility with a big room full of vendors. Once again, the people were incredibly nice and there was a wide variety of firearms and other valuables such as knives, coins, and jewelry.
As can be expected, most of the firearms were modern. There were very few military surplus firearms that used to be so common when I started "collecting" firearms back in the early 90's. I put "collecting" in quotes because I am not really a collector of firearms. I only own a few and they are definitely not prime specimens! Unfortunately, I lost the vast majority of my collection in a tragic boating accident.
The price of firearms has gone up substantially since I started buying them. SKS rifles that I could purchase for $100.00 decades ago are now marked at $600.00. Purchasing crates of those back when they were $100.00 each would have been a great investment. I know some people who did just that. For me it was not an option. As they say, it takes money to make money and I just did not have that kind of money available back in the day.
All in all, it was a great day. Although I miss the old gun show days where there were tables and tables full of surplus military weapons at bargain prices compared to today's prices, it was still fun to get out and peruse what is still available. I suppose those buying at today's prices will someday look back and say these were the good old days.
We ended our morning in Moriarty visiting booths at the local farmers market just across the street from the Civic Center. In some ways this was more entertaining than the gun show. We talked with vendors about art, honey, Santa Clause and even some politics. We even purchased a bag of pinto beans from a local grower.
Unfortunately, these days we seem more divided over politics than ever. It used to be you could have reasonable conversations with those who did not agree with you. If nothing else, you could politely agree to disagree. Not so much these days. At least at the gun show we all can agree on one constitutional right!
Clay