Amid recession, small arms trade alive and well in Barre
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Aaron Gingue of St. Johnsbury examines a rack of guns from Parro's Gun Shop of Waterbury during the annual Barre gun show on Saturday. The event continues today from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. PHOTO BY JEB WALLACE-BRODEUR |
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By SUSAN ALLEN STAFF WRITER - Published: February 7, 2010
BARRE – The Barre Auditorium was a sea of camo and rifle bags Saturday as an estimated 2,400 people from across the region poured into the 2010 Central Vermont Gun Show to buy, sell and trade everything from a $2,495 Civil War rifle to feather jewelry and organic oatmeal.
An estimated 1,100 are expected to attend the show today.
"It's been pretty steady," said John Simanskas, who has organized the show for 28 years. He said the economic slowdown hasn't affected the business, adding, "I heard gun shows are really booming this year."
So crowded was the Barre show that maneuvering through the aisles among the 215 vendors was difficult, with so many visitors – many with rifle bags slung over a shoulder or clutching a handgun case — paying the $6 admission to hunt for deals.
"We like trading or selling," said Mike Lanou, who unzipped his bag to show his 100-year-old Winchester .38-55 rifle. Lanou, who drove down from Newark, said he hoped to get $1,200 or more for the gun.
"I don't go for the new stuff," he said. "It's kind of junky if you ask me."
Simanskas said the show drew vendors and visitors from New Hampshire and New York. He noted that New York vendors cannot sell weapons in Vermont, but they can display at the show.
Inside the auditorium, tables were covered with displays of plastic bags filled with ammunition, rifles covered in hunters' camouflage or featuring stocks with artistic wooden inlays, 1950s U.S. Army lithographs of famous battles, antler candlesticks and $10 metal boxes to hold ammunition.
The Vermont Trappers Association displayed the pelts of everything from badger to otter. Badger was new this year, according to John Abts of the association.
"There are different textures with different furs," Abts said, noting that people buy the furs for garments and wall hangings. The otter pelt was selling for $110.
John Adams of Adams & Adams Engraving of Vershire was showing off his decorative engraved pistols, including one he designed to commemorate the Sept. 11 attacks.
"These are the newest items," Adams said of the 9/11 design. He said he updated his design to appeal to buyers, adding, "When the economy changes, you have to change with it."
He said sales have been solid.
Mark Humpal from Cornish, N.H., was busy showing his antique items, including guns, knives and jewelry, to browsers who crowded around his table. Asked what his highest-priced item was, Humpal cited two guns priced in the "five-figure range," including a musket carried by a soldier in a New Hampshire regiment in the Revolutionary War.
Another of his guns, Humpal said, was a rare harmonic rifle, one of the first repeating reflex rifles, also called underhammer rifles, made in Windsor by Nicanor Kindall (who reportedly paid inmate labor 32 cents a day to make the guns) in the 1800s.
Although the crowd was largely made up of men, some women were also looking at guns, knives, jewelry and even cookbooks, including "Dishing Up Vermont," by Tracy Medeiros, on a table of homesteading items from Wendy Mae's Simpler Living, connected to John's Gun Shop of Morrisville.
Richard Phillips of Vermont Field Sports in Middlebury said that AR15 rifles (similar to the M-16) are popular because military veterans are familiar with the weapons. He said the "good, clean stuff" is selling well this year, while the "beat-up stuff slowed down a little."
Thad Benoit of Benoit's Outdoor Suppliers in Randolph said people tend to spend a couple of years looking around for the gun they want, then head to the show to find that model.
"If they see it, they'll buy it," he said of the gun show customers. He said a lot of the sales are guns priced at $300 or less, and that many visitors to the show were simply "fixing up what they have to make it look better."
"People tend to wait for these shows and buy things," Benoit said. "The rest of the year, they might not go to a gun shop."
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