doublegunshop.com - home Forums Thread Like Summary - Hometown Hardware & Sporting Goods Stores

Ted's mention a few weeks ago of his 1993 purchase of a Charlin LC-1 from the Denny Dennis Hardware Store coincided with traveling back to my Missouri hometown for the funeral of my last bro-in-law and stirred up a lot of good memories of my boyhood hardware and sporting goods proprietor - the very same Denny Dennis. We already lived in the area when Denny opened the store in 1957 on the high bank side of the Meramec river. It was mainly hardware, plumbing and paint but the smaller sporting goods section was where the magic occurred. Whenever my Dad needed something I'd ride down to the store with him and when we went through the door I automatically turned left to the gun counter while he headed for the hardware side. Denny could and would talk to anyone including a kid with lots of questions and no money. Over the years the sporting goods expanded and pushed out the other inventory. Eventually it became a strictly sporting goods store. Sometime around the turn of the millenium the store burned. They rented another location temporarily and built back "bigger and better." My first 22 and my first fly rod came from that first store as did a lot of dreams, many of which came true.

This painting of the early store hangs just inside the front door.


The current store.



Memories of your own home town haunt?

Johnson Hardware in Sioux Falls was similar, main store was all hardware, take a right at the door and you went to the gun store. As a kid I was never chased off, though I couldn't afford most anything they had to sell. Cliff Foss, a customer, held court in the gun department. A brother to Joe Foss, Medal of Honor recipient, Governor of SD and numerous other accolades, Cliff was a joy to listen to. Among his lines, "Joe was a terrible pilot but a deadly wingshot" stuck with me. I could tell many, many more stories but this is likely my best.

Carl Meares and Sons Hardware, Fertilizer, Appliances and Sporting Goods in Fair Bluff North Carolina was THE place to go with my dad when I was a kid. It is also where he took me on my 13th birthday to buy my first gun of my own. We got home with a Remington Sportsmen Semi Auto in 12 gauge and I was walking on air. That is, until my mom saw it and found that it had cost $100 and convinced my dad that they could not afford that much. So, my to my dismay, he took the auto back. I got the borrowed 20 gauge single barrel of my uncle's that I had used for the past 4 years of so down off the rack and told my mom I was going hunting. I was gone for quite a while and killed nothing and finally decided to go on back home. When I mother asked if I killed any birds and I said no she said for me to hang my gun on the rack and get ready to eat supper. When I went down the hall to my gun rack, there before my eyes was the most beautiful little Stevens 311 12 gauge with 26 inch barrels I had ever laid eyes on hanging where the borrowed 20 had normally hung. Well, I still have the memories of the visits to Meares and Sons and that day in my mind and think of it often. Also, I still have that little Stevens 311. It will be my sons when I am gone. Sweet memories.

I bought my first hunting license and a 10X coat with my paper route money when I was 12. The store was run by two twin brothers who wore suits and bow ties. My father was there to advise me. I wore that coat till my late twenties. I must have looked like a coat with rubber boots stumbling through the deer woods back in 1964.

My friend, the late Bill Jaqua of Findlay Ohio started his sporting goods and gun shop business in downtown Findlay on the old courthouse square, in 1948. Bill started out being honest in business dealings, kept that reputation all his life. Sure miss him!! RWTF