I traded a motorized model airplane for a single shot .177 pump pistol when I was a young teen. It wasn’t a big deal, as like the OP, I learned to shoot .22 rifles at an early age and already owned two of them.
Yes. I had several of both, beginning about as far back as I can remember with a low power Daisy lever action BB gun. I still have it, and it still shoots. From there I moved up through a series of multi-pump and CO2 powered air rifles. I had my first shotgun at age 12. Growing up in the country was fun!
Yep. Crosman Powermaster 760 just like this: crosman powermaster 760 - Bing
Still got it, but it got damaged and is inop right now. Maybe I’ll fix it.
Now, I’ve got a Winchester 77XS : winchester 77xs - Bing
which is very accurate (even without the scope, which I’ve never bothered to mount) that I protect the garden with, daily. I am the scourge of Mr. Fuzzy Bunny 'round here.
No. I’d shoot my eye out.
Ralphie, is that you?
I skipped BB guns and went right to a .22 rifle, somewhere between age 8 and 11. I can’t remember for sure. First a single shot bolt action, then a deadly semi-automatic assault rifle! Well, you could describe it that way.
He can’t read what you wrote. He has soap blindness!
I had a Daisy 1894 lever action BB rifle, then a Crosman 760; then a Sheridan Blue Streak. As an adult I bought a few spring piston pellet rifles and a kick-ass Crosman CO2 pistol. I was shooting the pistol a few days ago. I also got into shooting .22 CB rimfire out of a lever action rifle. It’s about as loud (out of a long barrel) as a pellet gun but with much more power.
I had a Daisy. Like others in the thread my mom would drop a few of us boys off at the dump to shoot bottles. No one ever got hurt. It was a lot of fun.
Growing up, guns of all kinds were absolutely prohibited in my household. This was so extreme that when I got a tiny, plastic gun in a Crackerjack box – non-functional, about an inch long – it was taken away from me. Cap guns and suction cup dart guns were out of the question. Is it any wonder that, when I was sent to a psychiatrist once, that cap guns and dart guns were my favorite toy, used under the watchful eye of the psychiatrist dude?
A same-age friend got a Daisy “air rifle” (really a spring-loaded BB gun) and I had so much fun with it that I decided to get one myself at about age 12. This required placing an order through a Sears catalog, and timing the delivery to the exact day that I would be home to accept and pay for a COD purchase without my parents knowing anything about it. I kept it hidden for several years, using it only when no one else was home.
As an adult, although I’m not in favor of kids having working guns without supervision, I feel this kind of attitude extremism is counter-productive. Better to instruct than prohibit.
I had one of the cheap plastic stock Daisy lever actions that I got for Christmas when I was 6. Five Christmases later I got a shotgun. I haven’t owned a gun since I’ve been on my own, but I’ll occasionally do some target shooting when I visit my parents.
I had a Daisy BB gun I got when I was 8 or so - I still have it, but it hasn’t been fired in years, heck, I haven’t bought BB’s in many, many years…my brother and I would do chores on the neighboring farms, so we bought matching Crossman 0.177 pump rifles when I was 10 and he was 12…he had a single shot 0.22, I think it was a Savage, but that one is long gone…I bought a Remington 0.22 when I was 14, and my grandfather gave us single shot 0.410 shotguns right about the same time with the intent of teaching us to hunt - we both shot rabbits that day, but neither of us got the hunting bug…I grew up on a little farm and we had a perfect natural shooting range out in a back field…we shot 0.22’s in the Boy Scouts, by that point, my brother and I were pretty good shots…we were actually talking about this at work today, the way to demystify firearms for kids and people is to teach them to respect, safely handle and proper shoot firearms…
I got a Daisy rifle for Christmas one year. I hadn’t asked for it.
I remember thinking, “Cool! I have a gun!” but it didn’t take me long to figure out how ineffectual it was. I remember setting up some crackers and shooting at them, and they didn’t even break. At first I thought I had missed; then I found a BB embedded in one of the crackers. 
Yes. My younger brother and I shared one, until we got busted for shooting out the screen door of the old lady who lived behind us.
I think we had it for two months. 
Yeah I had an air pellet rifle when I was about 12. The only rule was no shooting animals, and I never did (with that gun, at least).
No, I can’t remember anyone having a BB/pellet gun when I was growing up. My dad had a .22 that we shot a couple of times, but it made me feel more anxious than entertained.
Nope. I actually did have a cousin who had her eye shot out. My dad’s brother’s daughter was pretty young, but I can’t remember how old. 12-ish. I never knew the boy, but he accidentally shot her eye out. Having a relative with a glass eye who wasn’t hypothetical meant no bb gun for me.
Yes. I had a pump BB gun with scope that I shot a ton.
You feel bad about a squirrel? I shot a pretty yellow bird I never saw before,or since, then later found out it was the state bird. Yeah, I felt bad
Nope. No BB guns at my house.
Believe it or not… I was literally told I would “put someones eye out” and “we would lose the house”.:eek::smack:
The Army taught me how to deal with yellow birds, specifically ones with yellow bills. 