What a smile! And what a bag of ducks. Pat Peacock was one of history`s greatest duck callers. A champion at just 12 years old, she remains the only woman to win the World`s Championship Duck Calling Contest twice (1955 and 1956) and the Champion of Champions title (1960).

Photo caption: "Pat Peacock, legendary duck caller and a pioneer amongst women in the sport of duck hunting. (Photo courtesy of Mossy Oak, recolored by @fourszn_outdoors)"
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#patpeacock #duckhunting #duckcalling #waterfowlhunting #worldduckcallingchampionship ...

"The impetus for recognition of the Second Amendment right to bear arms goes far further back than King George III`s attempt to disarm the American colonists, which helped to spark the American Revolution. While it is a universal law of history that tyrants attempt to disarm their subjects, the Americans were cognizant of the disarming measures taken by kings in seventeenth century England. Those measures took various forms, from laws imposing property qualifications to possess firearms to searches for and confiscation of firearms.

"In the famous prosecution of Sir John Knight, the Catholic King James II sought to prosecute a Protestant political enemy for carrying arms under the all-but-forgotten medieval Statue of Northampton. It backfired when the court ruled that the law applied only to persons going armed in a manner to terrify others.

"In the controversy over the Second Amendment today, it is argued by some that the Statute of Northampton criminalized even the peaceable carrying of arms, that the early Statute somehow overrides the later constitutional right to bear arms, and thus that the government may prohibit the people from bearing arms outside the home and in public. Some even argue that Sir John Knight was not really acquitted because he carried arms without evil intent, but (so the theory goes) because he acted as a government agent.

"It seems farfetched to claim that an obscure medieval English statute negates an American constitutional right...."

Halbrook, The Right to Bear Arms: A Constitutional Right of the People or a Privilege of the Ruling Class?, p. 23 (hardback edition). Chapter 1 of this book tells the "story of the Statute, the Knight case, and how the English common law forbade the carrying of arms only if one did so intending to terrorize his fellow subjects."

Image: the Coat of Arms of England used by English Kings prior to 1340.
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#guncontrol #2ahistory #kinggeorgeIII #StatuteofNorthampton #therighttobeararmshalbrook ...

"`[A]s early as 1907, Winchester was offering the general public ten-shot magazines for use with its .351 caliber semi-automatic rifles....Many of the early semi-automatic rifles were available with pistol grips.` Then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh in Heller v. District of Columbia, 670 F.3d 1244, 1287 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (dissenting). The Model 1907 had a detachable magazine, allowing an empty magazine to be replaced with a loaded magazine in seconds."

From Halbrook, America`s Rifle: The Case for the AR-15, p. 146 (photo and caption). .
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#semiautomaticrifles #winchestermodel1907 #winchesterrifles #AmericasRifleTheCaseForTheAR15 #judgekavanaugh ...

During World War II, Winchester was one of the American companies that helped arm the nation`s fighting forces, producing firearms and ammunition on a massive scale. This advertisement reflects not only the company`s long history, but also the important role that private industry played in supporting the Allied war effort.

Image: 1940s Winchester advertisement
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#wwiifirearms #winchesterrifle #winchesterrifles #vintagegunads #americanguns ...

Some of my fondest childhood memories involve summer camp and the many sports and activities we enjoyed. These vintage photos are a reminder of a time when learning safe rifle marksmanship was a common part of the summer camp experience, teaching responsibility, discipline, and confidence alongside the fun.
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#OutdoorHeritage #YouthMarksmanship #VintageAmerica #firearmstraining #2aheritage ...

"In Reichskristallnacht, which took place in November 1938, the Nazis went on a rampage breaking into Jewish homes and businesses, burning synagogues, and throwing thousands of Jewish men into concentration camps. To ensure that the Nazi thugs would not get hurt, SS head Heinrich Himmler decreed that any Jew found with a firearm would be sentenced to twenty years in a concentration camp.

"As Gun Control in the Third Reich recounts, Berlin President Wolf Heinrich von Helldorf began a campaign to confiscate all firearms from Jews two months before the pogrom began, proving that the pogrom was not a spontaneous action but was preplanned by the Nazi hierarchy. New documents published since this book was written show that the disarming was planned months earlier, demonstrating even more forcibly the critical importance to the National Socialist hierarchy of confiscating all arms from the Jews.

"Jewish gun owners were targeted for revocation of their permits beginning in 1933, and in 1935 the Gestapo issued a directive that, in general, permits should not be issued to Jews. Those directives did not necessarily prohibit the mere keeping of guns. However, placing Jews into the legal category of "Asozialer" (antisocial elements) subjected them to systematic police surveillance, preventive detention, and a `prohibition on carrying or possessing arms.` "

From Halbrook, Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming the Jews and "Enemies of the State", Preface to the 2025 edition.
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#nazigermanyhistory #guncontrol #guncontrolinthethirdreich #ww2history #kristallnacht ...

In 1976, I took my two oldest children with me to the National Archives to see the Declaration of Independence. It was a moving experience to see our nation`s founding document preserved in the dimly lit Rotunda.

Happy 250th birthday to our country! 🎆 May the liberties proclaimed in the Declaration and secured by our Constitution always be protected.

Photos: The black-and-white photo on the left shows the Declaration in the original helium-filled preservation case that visitors—including my children and I in 1976—would have seen. The color photo on the right shows the Declaration as it is displayed today in its argon-filled preservation case.
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#Semiquincentennial #Bicentennial #declarationofindependence #NationalArchives #americanfreedom ...

"The Declaration of Independence, drafted by Thomas Jefferson and signed by the members of the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, upheld the right of the people to assert their sovereignty over an oppressive government. Just governments are created by the consent of the governed to secure the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, but when a government `becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government....`"
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"Inherent in the Declaration`s philosophy is the right of the people to keep and bear arms to defend themselves from such depredations and...`to throw off such government.` And to prevent just that, in 1777, Undersecretary of State William Knox in the British Colonial Office recommended to members of the Ministry, among other measures: `The Militia Laws should be repealed and non suffered to be re-enacted, & the Arms of all the People should be taken away....`

"But it was too late either to abolish the militias or confiscate the populace`s firearms...."

From Halbrook, The Right to Bear Arms: A Constitutional Right of the People or a Privilege of the Ruling Class?, pgs. 144-145 (hardback edition).

Photo: from the "Call to Arms: The Soldier and the Revolutionary War" exhibit at the National Museum of the United States Army in Fort Belvoir, Virginia. The Museum`s Soldier Profile for this life-sized figure reads: "Sylvanus Wood was one of the militia men who stood at Lexington. Like many, he wore civilian clothing to the action. He recalled Capt. John Parker saying, "Every man of you who is equipped, follow me." Later that day, Wood became the first American to capture a British soldier."
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#usarmymuseum #revwar250 #americanmilitia #thedeclarationofindependence #therighttobeararmshalbrook ...