Kentucky's State Gun?

Okay, so Utah has taken the nation once more where no state has gone before: they're now the first to designate an official state gun.

The state gun of Utah is now the Browning M1911 semiautomatic pistol, and Governor Gary Herbert is defending this groundbreaking move from anti-gun critics. "It's about honoring John Moses Browning and paying tribute to the man as an innovator and entrepreneur and someone who has given a lot to the state of Utah," he said. And according to the TPM story linked to above, the Utah State Senate insisted that language be added to the bill that states that the designation in no way condones violence.

I've always seen a lot of similarities between the great state of Utah and our glorious commonwealth. Both have histories speckled with intrigue, exploration, and freethinking in the finest sense of American frontiersman tradition. So it probably won't be too long before somebody in Kentucky legislature decides to join our colleagues to the West and get on the gun tip.

I have some modest propopals here.


The Kentucky Long Rifle would be the most obvious choice, seeing as it was Daniel Boone's favorite rifle. He nicknamed his "Tick-licker", stemming from boasts of his shooting accuracy, hyperbolically stated to be so great that he could shoot a tick off a deer. The Long Rifle has a ridiculously long barrel by modern standards - sometimes more than four feet - and displays very attractively.


However, there's also the popular concept of the Kentucky Dueling Pistol. Without making a specific nod to any single manufacturer, Kentucky could simply appoint the "dueling pistol" to be its official state firearm represented by an image of a pair of them in a velour-lined case.


On the other hand, the Thompson machine gun, or "Tommy Gun", was invented by Kentuckian John Taliaferro Thompson, and a historical nod to him might be analogous to what the folks in Utah did. However, there would be an inevitable outcry from people saying that the gun's association with gangsterism would set the wrong tone.

But in the final analysis, I believe it would be most fitting to honor Kentucky artist J.T. Dockery, who recently celebrated a gallery exhibit of his graphic novel Spud Crazy, by nominating the official Kentucky weapon to be the Spud Gun.

Either that or the Love Gun.