" TARGET PRACTICE Dee Carey shows the bullet marks on her target after a practice session Saturday at The Gun Shop in Lancaster. The event was designed to make women more confident with firearms. "ENNIFER X HERNANDEZ/Valley Press
Posted on 05/15/2003 9:10:41 PM PDT by BenLurkin
LANCASTER - Even Annie Oakley, the famous gun-slinging cowgirl, had to start at the beginning.
Although the 30 Antelope Valley women who attended the Ladies' Handgun and Shooting Seminar on Saturday did not aspire to be the next Oakley, many of them shot a gun for the first time down in the basement of The Gun Shop on Sierra Highway north of Avenue J.
The seminar was designed to offer a gun safety and a how-to-shoot class for experienced shooters and beginners, and organizers hoped to make women like Aida Wells of Lancaster more confident with a firearm.
Wells said she came to the seminar to learn how to shoot. Her ex-husband had guns, but she never shot one. Now that she is single again, she wants one to protect herself.
"I didn't know anything about it," Wells said. "I didn't want to take a chance."
She planned to overcome her fear of a firearm by learning the proper, safe way to handle one.
"It's like any other thing. You have to learn how to do it and do it with caution," Wells said.
Sponsored by Assemblywoman Sharon Runner, R-Lancaster, state Sen. William J. "Pete" Knight, R-Palmdale, and the California Second Amendment Sisters, the ladies' seminar taught women how to handle and shoot a handgun safely.
"I see there is a need," Runner said. "Women want to protect themselves and keep themselves and their families safe."
Four years ago, Runner brought some of her friends to The Gun Shop to learn how to shoot. Many had been given guns by their husbands, guns they didn't know how to fire.
Runner learned how to shoot at the Lancaster range, and has been to ranges two other times before Saturday.
Runner doesn't own a gun, but said she was looking to buy one since she is often alone at night, traveling dark desert roads to visit constituents. She said she plans to apply for a concealed weapons permit.
"Law-abiding citizens who go through the process to own a gun are not the people out there shooting and killing people," Runner said.
Twenty-eight other women from across the Antelope Valley joined Runner and Wells to learn or review how to shoot a handgun. Seven of the women were experienced shooters who wanted to take a formal gun safety class, while the other 23 came to learn how to use a handgun.
Judith Fox of Acton said she only had fired a gun once, on a friend's farm when she was a child.
She doesn't own a gun but would like to have one for her protection.
"I'd also like to learn how to shoot," she said.
Experienced shooter Sondra Threlfall of Quartz Hill said she wanted a brush-up course on gun safety and to be around like-minded women.
"It's the sport, the challenge of hitting the targets and just to stay familiar with the gun," Threlfall said.
Threlfall said her husband taught her how to shoot when she was 17. She scored a 255 out of 300 on the shooting range.
Not all experienced shooters enjoy the sport. Emily Berg, the California representative of the Second Amendment Sisters, said she doesn't like the noise or getting dirty.
"You don't have to do it 24/7," Berg said. "The important thing is to know how."
Her organization promotes safety and education of gun ownership and the protection of the Second Amendment.
Berg's grandfather founded The Gun Shop, and she can't remember how old she was when she learned how to shoot.
Mary Ferrazzam of Lake Los Angeles was taught how to shoot a gun by friends, but wanted to take a formal gun course. She lives on 10 acres in the "middle of nowhere" and feels the need to protect herself. She especially wants to scare coyotes away from her animals.
"I shoot but I very rarely hit anything," she said, adding that she only spooks the coyotes with the noise.
Some beginners are also scared by the noise of guns, especially in indoor ranges, said National Rifle Association instructor Tom Watt, who taught the noncertified courses.
One woman asked him how to overcome what her husband called "flinching."
"You're afraid of it," he said. "It's not going to hurt you. You'll have a lot of fun down there (in the basement shooting range). Just relax.
"The noise is the one thing - the most spooky part of the gun," Watt added.
Watt also told the women that they develop their skills quicker than male beginners. What helps women is that they aren't trying to be the next John Waynes.
"They don't have bad tendencies," Watt said. "They tend to go up there, listen to what is said, and - boom! - they're done."
" TARGET PRACTICE Dee Carey shows the bullet marks on her target after a practice session Saturday at The Gun Shop in Lancaster. The event was designed to make women more confident with firearms. "The rest is pure gravy!
Try out a 5 shot .44Special revolver. Compact, inexpensive, low recoil, and it's a real manstopper.
No safety or chambering a round worries to trip you up under stress. Just point and squeeze.
It's an uphill climb against the propaganda spewed out by ABCNNBCS.
And maybe he'll bring out a .500 linebaugh and make you flinch on the firing line .....
There's not that big a need to be so competitive here.
Besides ... you sucked once too (at shooting). Then you kept practicing. Cut the lady some slack.
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