Archie the Neighbor

I have mentioned the crotchety old WWII veteran.

His ‘thing’ back in the day was target archery, field archey. I wish I shot as well with a pistol as he shot with a bow. Then again he shot maybe a million arrows. Once shot a 506 out of 560. Not bad for an amatuer.

He took zero interest in firearms. Except for one. The M3 Greasegun.

You see, he was in the Navy in the Pacific (my other neighbor was in Destroyers in the Atlantic, and another was in Viet Nam doing something with Riverine Patrol. Big Navy area. Everyone else on this street speaks Spanish.) And his jobs was Electrician Mate, especially on the Higgins boats that sent their Marines to the beach at Kwajellein, &c. My neighbor (let’s call him Archie) was fascinated with the Marine’s M3 Greaseguns. He just thought they were neat. The Marines would let him hold one just to hold it. You know how that is.
Besides being an archer, Archie is a tinker. He likes how things work. And he was an auto-body man and marine motor mechanic. So the process to MAKE a Greasegun fascinated him, being made by a headlight factory of General Motors and all.

He never talked about any other kind of firearms. Ever.

Then I found out why.

He has one.

Oh my!

And he showed it to me this past weekend.

Wait wait wait… Before you get excited… Archie is a smart cookie. He actually got the tax stamp for the thing in the early 60s. So it is legit. He hasn’t fired it since the 50s. But, while not a gun guy, he is a mechanical guy. He appears to have kept it very clean back then. I have new guns with bores less shiny. It doesn’t look like he’s done it any harm. And he only has the one magazine. It, for some reason, does look to be in sorry shape.

So why is he showing it to me, now? After keeping it a secret for years despite knowing my interest? Well, like all WWII vets he is getting on in years. And he has been seeing his estate planner recently. When talking about his assets his lawyer actually realized the implications involved with a machine gun and all, trust wise. So he got that all squared away a few months ago. Archie just has daughters and grandsons too young to appreciate. The daughters are a bit hoplophobic too. So Archie had no one to bequeath the sub machine gun to in his will/trust…

Except for this youngish neighbor that helps him out with tech support for his computer and shoots the shite with him over beers on his back deck. A neighbor that like WWII history and was also in the Navy. A neighbor that is gobsmacked by his generosity.

Well that's ONE way to get a free machine gun, I guess. At least it's a good caliber.