Thousands flock to Gun and Collectibles Show
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/12/2018 (2471 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
The Brandon Gun and Collectibles Show aims to please, and it was right on target this weekend.
Thousands of gun enthusiasts packed into the Manitoba Room at the Keystone Centre Saturday for the first day of the 35th annual show, presented each year by the Brandon Wildlife Association.
Young, old and in between checked out table after table of guns of every description, knives, collectible toys, ammunition, moccasins and gloves and even handmade toques and scarves on display by the approximately 200 vendors.
Holding a rifle in one hand and his six-year-old son, Henry, in the other, Travis Sleep said he was impressed by the turnout Saturday.
“It’s really a nice, big show,” said Sleep, who recently moved his family to Manitoba from Saskatchewan.
Sleep said he enjoys both hunting and target shooting, and the gun show gives him the opportunity to instil an appreciation for guns in his young son.
“He’s learning,” Sleep said. “My daughter, when she was five, I bought her a rifle.”
But, he said, even though Henry is older than when she started, he is still a bit too hyper to be handling a loaded gun.
“We’re taking it a little bit slower,” he said.
Don Teale, president of the Brandon Wildlife Association, said that over the two days of the show, between 2,700 and 2,800 people generally stop in to buy, sell, trade or just admire the merchandise.
“It’s the biggest one around,” said Teale, who has been involved in the gun show since its inception.
It attracts vendors and shoppers from both sides of the Manitoba border, and that’s good for the local economy, he said as visitors stopped by the wildlife association’s table to purchase a raffle ticket.
Many of the out-of-town vendors stay at the adjacent Canad Inns Destination Centre Brandon and shop at the local stores, Teale said.
“So it’s a good support for the local community,” he said.
“This is a planned event for a lot of people.”
Teale, a retired sergeant-major in the Canadian Forces, said as far as he is concerned, the ever-present controversy surrounding gun ownership is largely unfounded.
“The odd time, a guy goes off his nut,” he said. “I always put it in plain language: stupidity and insanity.”
After there is a tragedy involving a weapon, there is often an outcry to ban them, he said, but if you count how many people are killed by cars, do you then call for a ban on cars?
» brobertson@brandonsun.com
» Twitter: @BudRobertson4