At a time when an alarming number of mass shootings continue to happen all over America, the Us & Them team was recently honored with a first place award for best documentary from Virginias Associated Press Broadcasters. In this report, we explore the foundations of the Second Amendment and the cultural and historical beliefs and myths that contribute to our very American divide over guns.
Us & Them was recently honored with a first place award for best documentary from Virginias Associated Press Broadcasters.
Our episode called “The Gun Divide” looks at gun ownership in America, and the way our social, political and racial divisions fuel gun purchases. The year 2020 showed a historic rise in gun violence. Guns killed a record 45,000 people, the majority of them by suicide.
Us & Them host Trey Kay explores the foundations of the Second Amendment and the cultural and historical beliefs and myths that contribute to our very American divide over guns.
Gun ownership is at record levels across the country with 40 percent of adults saying they have at least one firearm in their home. But what rights does the Second Amendment give us?
We’re sharing this award-winning episode with you again, from our archives.
This episode of Us & Them is presented with support from the West Virginia Humanities Council, The Greater Kanawha Valley Foundation and the CRC Foundation.
Subscribe to Us & Them on Apple Podcasts, NPR One, RadioPublic, Spotify, Stitcher and beyond.
Don Radcliffe is a pharmacist at Good Family Pharmacy in Pinch, WV. In February 2015, Radcliff shot and killed a masked armed robber from behind the pharmacy counter during a failed robbery. Credit: Trey Kay/West Virginia Public BroadcastingYou can have prescriptions filled at the Good Family Pharmacy in Pinch, WV. They also sell toiletries, vitamins, cosmetics and, as pharmacist Don Radcliff told Us & Them host Trey Kay, they offer customers something a little extra — the pharmacy also sells firearms. This photo shows two of the three gun safes in the pharmacy’s stock room. A stuffed bobcat keeps guard. Credit: Trey Kay/West Virginia Public BroadcastingDanielle Walker served for five years as a Democratic member of the West Virginia House of Delegates. She recently made history by becoming the first African American to serve as the Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union of West Virginia. She is photographed here with Us & Them host Trey Kay. Walker reluctantly bought a firearm after receiving death threats. She says these threats started in 2020 after she attended a Black Lives Matter rally in Kingwood, WV. Credit: Trey Kay/West Virginia Public BroadcastingIn the United States, Black Americans are 10 times more likely to die from gun violence than white Americans. The number goes up for Black children and teens — who are 14 times more likely than white children to die from a gunshot. The small state of West Virginia reveals similar disparities. Data show Black West Virginians are victims of gun homicide at 5 times the rate of white West Virginians. Across the state each year, an average of nearly one person a day is killed by guns. Reverend Matthew Watts has been a pastor at Grace Bible Church on Charleston’s West Side for more than three decades. He also lives in the community, and tries to bring attention to its struggles. Credit: Grace Bible ChurchJim McJunkin is a retired pediatrician in Charleston, WV. He now spends much of his time as an unpaid legislative representative for Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense. That’s a program launched ten years ago after Sandy Hook — the mass shooting of school children in Newtown, CT. The group is an arm of Everytown, a national organization devoted to stopping gun violence. He is pictured here with Deanna McKinney, a mother whose son was shot and killed on the front porch of her home on Charleston’s West Side. Credit: James McJunkinHistorian Jennifer Tucker specializes in the history of industrialization, science and law. Tucker recently launched the Center for the Study of Guns and Society at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. Courtesy PhotoDarrell Miller is a Duke University law professor and co-founder of the Duke Center for Firearms Law. He writes and teaches in the areas of civil rights, constitutional law, civil procedure, state and local government law, and legal history. His scholarship on the Second and Thirteenth Amendments has been published in leading law reviews such as the Yale Law Journal, the University of Chicago Law Review, and the Columbia Law Review, and has been cited by the Supreme Court of the United States, the United States Courts of Appeals, the United States District Courts, and in congressional testimony and legal briefs. Credit: Duke LawUs & Them host Trey Kay practicing his shooting with friends in Bath County, VA. Credit: Christopher Kay
On this West Virginia Morning, after years of failed attempts, Senate Bill 10, the Campus Self-Defense Act, also known as Campus Carry, passed in the recently completed legislative session. The new law authorized the concealed carry of firearms in certain areas of college and university campuses.
On this West Virginia Morning, after years of failed attempts, Senate Bill 10, the Campus Self-Defense Act, also known as Campus Carry, passed in the recently completed legislative session. The new law authorized the concealed carry of firearms in certain areas of college and university campuses.
West Virginia’s institutions of higher education largely opposed campus carry. As Randy Yohe shows us, campus leaders at big and small schools say they’ll need all year and a quarter to prepare before SB 10 becomes law.
West Virginia Morning is a production of West Virginia Public Broadcasting which is solely responsible for its content.
Support for our news bureaus comes from West Virginia University, Concord University, and Shepherd University.
Our News Director Eric Douglas produced this episode.
Listen to West Virginia Morning weekdays at 7:43 a.m. on WVPB Radio or subscribe to the podcast and never miss an episode. #WVMorning
We explore the foundations of the Second Amendment and the cultural and historical beliefs and myths that contribute to our very American divide over guns.
America has roughly 400 million guns in circulation. Our divisions – social, political and racial – and our fear of those differences fuel even more gun purchases. 2020 showed a historic rise in gun violence. Guns killed a record 45,000 people, the majority of them by suicide.
In this episode of Us & Them we explore the foundations of the Second Amendment and the cultural and historical beliefs and myths that contribute to our very American divide over guns.
Gun ownership is at record levels across the country with 40 percent of adults saying they have at least one firearm in their home. But what rights does the Second Amendment give us? And what happens if our collective arsenal intersects with our widespread distrust of our institutions, our government, and each other?
This episode of Us & Them is presented with support from the West Virginia Humanities Council, The Greater Kanawha Valley Foundation and the CRC Foundation.
Subscribe to Us & Them on Apple Podcasts, NPR One, RadioPublic, Spotify, Stitcher and beyond.
Trey Kay
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Don Radcliffe is a pharmacist at Good Family Pharmacy in Pinch, WV. In February 2015, Radcliff shot and killed a masked armed robber from behind the pharmacy counter during a failed robbery.
Trey Kay
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You can have prescriptions filled at the Good Family Pharmacy in Pinch, WV. They also sell toiletries, vitamins, cosmetics and, as pharmacist Don Radcliff told Us & Them host Trey Kay, they offer customers something a little extra — the pharmacy also sells firearms. This photo shows two of the three gun safes in the pharmacy’s stock room. A stuffed bobcat keeps guard.
Trey Kay
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Danielle Walker is a Democratic member of the West Virginia House of Delegates. She is the only African American woman in the West Virginia State Legislature. She is photographed here with Us & Them host Trey Kay. Delegate Walker reluctantly bought a firearm after receiving death threats. She says these threats started in 2020, after she attended a Black Lives Matter rally in Kingwood, WV.
Grace Bible Church
In the United States, Black Americans are 10 times more likely to die from gun violence than white Americans. The number goes up for Black children and teens – who are 14 times more likely than white children to die from a gunshot. The small state of West Virginia reveals similar disparities. Data show Black West Virginians are victims of gun homicide at 5 times the rate of white West Virginians. Across the state each year, an average of nearly one person a day is killed by guns. Reverend Matthew Watts has been a pastor at Grace Bible Church on Charleston’s West Side for more than three decades. He also lives in the community, and tries to bring attention to its struggles.
Jim McJunkin
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Jim McJunkin is a retired pediatrician in Charleston, WV. He now spends much of his time as an unpaid legislative representative for Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense. That’s a program launched ten years ago after Sandy Hook — the mass shooting of school children in Newtown, Connecticut. The group is an arm of Everytown, a national organization devoted to stopping gun violence. He is pictured here with Deanna McKinney, a mother whose son was shot and killed on the front porch of her home on Charleston’s West Side.
Jennifer Tucker
/
Historian Jennifer Tucker specializes in the history of industrialization, science and law. Tucker recently launched the Center for the Study of Guns and Society at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut.
Duke Law
Darrell Miller is a Duke University law professor and co-founder of the Duke Center for Firearms Law. He writes and teaches in the areas of civil rights, constitutional law, civil procedure, state and local government law, and legal history. His scholarship on the Second and Thirteenth Amendments has been published in leading law reviews such as the Yale Law Journal, the University of Chicago Law Review, and the Columbia Law Review, and has been cited by the Supreme Court of the United States, the United States Courts of Appeals, the United States District Courts, and in congressional testimony and legal briefs.
Chris Kay
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Us & Them host Trey Kay practicing his shooting with friends in Bath County, VA.
Pennsylvania gun stores operate by appointment only, the result of a compromise to Gov. Tom Wolf’s order closing all businesses not defined as “life-sustaining,” meant to help slow the spread of COVID-19. As the federal relief funds filtered into bank accounts, Corn’s calendar of 30-minute appointments filled up, even though the store’s inventory has been depleted by six weeks of brisk sales.
As society abruptly transformed entirely in the face of the novel coronavirus pandemic and a partial societal shutdown meant to contain it, thousands of Americans responded by buying a gun. The FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System processed 3.7 million checks in March, an increase from 2.6 million checks in March of 2019. Over the last five years, the NICB, a measure of how many people tried to buy a gun, usually processes about 2 million background checks a month.
Gun store owners say the influx is coming from first-time firearm buyers, fearful society could collapse into theft and marauding, as food and supplies run scarce, poverty deepens and police are rendered ineffective. Buyers are still filing into gun stores, which remain open in most Appalachian states, but first-timers don’t always have access to the ranges, gun clubs and classes to learn about their new lethal weapons. Some resort to tutorials on YouTube.
Gun sales have historically been impacted by current events. The number of background checks budged upward in early 2013, after the Sandy Hook school shooting stirred momentum for gun control, reaching 2.5 million checks that January.
Corn, whose store is about 20 miles up the Allegheny River from downtown Pittsburgh, says this sales surge is different. “Those were our usual customers,” he recalls. They wanted guns that might be banned in the near future. “Now, it’s first-time buyers looking for home protection.”
Credit Nick Keppler / 100 Days in Appalachia
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100 Days in Appalachia
Alex Corn, owner of the Verona Gun Safe, stays open by appointment during the COVID-19 pandemic, and appointments are filling up.
After a month of catering to this demand, a wall-length display at his store is mostly empty space. It usually contains more than a hundred handguns in stair-like tiers, but now holds just 15 and some dust. Above them, in the rifle display, stand a few high-priced models and plenty of hunting guns with scopes. The modest-priced shotguns best for shooting an intruder have been snapped up. Corn is relieved his suppliers came through with boxes of nine-millimeter bullets, the most common caliber. He sold out in March.
Credit Nick Keppler / 100 Days in Appalachia
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100 Days in Appalachia
After weeks of brisk sales and heavy demand, the inventory of the Verona Gun Safe is depleted.
“I lost out on some $500 gun sales because I didn’t have a $20 box of ammo,” he says.
As the rest of Verona’s main street is shuttered, Eric Cartwright comes into the Verona Gun Safe hoping to buy a Kel-Tec SUB-2000 semi-automatic rifle. It would be his first gun.
“There’s multiple reasons I want it,” says Cartwright, 34. “Right now, I want to protect my family in case of martial law. I don’t want to leave my safety up to the government.” Cartwright wears a hoodie adorned with the logo of his heating and cooling business. He has vehicles and equipment that would be tempting targets if poverty drives people to theft, he said.
However, three DUIs complicate the process for Cartwright. Corn spends many of his work hours shepherding customers through the background check process, the reflection of a computer screen glowing in his thick eyeglasses. He advises Cartwright not to fill in the application; some questions about crimes can read like legalease and answering them incorrectly can halt the process (or even lead to criminal prosecution).
Cartwright, wearing a neatly trimmed beard and ponytail and carrying a vape pen, seems frustrated. His last DUI was 2009. “I’ve turned my life around,” he says. “I shouldn’t have to give up my Second Amendment rights.”
Corn moves on to his next appointment and Cartwright leaves with the business card of a local gun rights attorney. Many others are leaving gun shops with their first piece.
The Psychological Factor
Credit Justin Hayhurst / 100 Days in Appalachia
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100 Days in Appalachia
Lanae Lumsden, right, and her husband Gregory Winborne have resided with her family in the borough of Avalon for seven years. In July 2018, at the nearby Jackman Bar & Restaurant, Brighton Heights resident Paul Morris was violently assaulted by alleged members of a white supremacist group. Lumsden feared for her family’s safety. The recent COVID-19 outbreaks in the United States and the uncertainty that ensued, has led Lumsden and her husband to purchase a firearm.
Lanae Lumsden and her husband Gregory Winborne, of Avalon, Pennsylvania, another Pittsburgh suburb, drove to a sporting goods superstore in March and purchased a 20-gauge shotgun for $275 and a nine-millimeter handgun for $300.
“We had been thinking about it for a while,” said Lumsden, 40. The couple considered buying firearms in 2018 after neo-Nazis allegedly assaulted a black man at a bar in their town.
“We are black and live in the suburbs,” Lumsden said. “We felt more uncomfortable with [the coronavirus] happening. I felt like if something did happen, it would happen to us first.”
Winborne’s mother, a corrections officer, introduced him to guns. He and his wife shoot regularly with friends, but these are their first firearm purchases. The shotgun will stay at home and they intend to apply for concealed carry permits for the handgun. Right now, both sit in a bedroom drawer.
“We haven’t been able to shoot them,” says Winborne, 41. “We can’t even go to the range.”
In Pennsylvania, gun ranges on state lands are closed but ranges that are in private clubs are open at the discretion of their owners. Even if they could find a club, they try to stay at their house, mostly, working from home and caring for four kids, ages 5 to 18. But the guns are a comfort, Winborne said, as he envisions a worst-case scenario is a “zombie apocalypse, when people are just trying to take things for themselves.”
David Yamane, a professor of sociology at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, who studies gun culture, said first-time buyers are often purchasing some peace of mind, due to a personal trauma or fears about their neighborhoods or society. “I think the intended purpose of the purchase is physical security and they are also attempting to buy some psychological security,” he said.
While people are flooded with anxiety right now— over their health, their jobs, their savings— the gun allows them to put down the worry they’ll be defenseless against desperate hordes.
“It’s like the toilet paper,” said Yamane, a commodity shoppers stockpiled in March. “If they can’t have anything else until control, they know they have that one thing under control.”
These anxieties might be exaggerated. Arrests and calls for police service have decreased in some U.S. cities amid the coronavirus lockdowns, as depopulated streets leave fewer opportunities for muggings and crimes of opportunity. The Pittsburgh Bureau of Police reported a 3.5-percent dip in the first three months of 2020, compared to 2019. Still, some people still fret that a criminal will come to strong-arm them.
“People have supplies but unless they can defend them, they are only storing them for the next-most aggressive guy in their neighborhood,” said Josh Rowe, co-owner of Allegheny Arms and Gun Works, located in Pittsburgh’s southern suburbs. “That’s what we’ve heard.”
His store has also seen an uptick in sales from first-time buyers. They come in with nightmare predictions: Police forces will be neutered, as their ranks are depleted because of officers sick with the virus, or police will cease patrolling to avoid catching it. Former inmates will flood out, as authorities decrease populations in jails and prisons, and they will fall into gleeful recidivism. Opioid addicts will descend into desperation and break into homes to steal something to sell to get a fix.
“It’s first-time buyers and they realize they need to take responsibility for me and mine,” said Rowe. “These are not ‘gun nuts.’ That’s not who we are seeing. It’s a good cross section of people.”
First-Time Buyers and the Elusive 9 Millimeter
Chuck Bodner, of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, waited eight hours waiting in line outside a gun store called The Bunker that was only accepting two customers at a time due to coronavirus precautions. After a day spent, his background check stalled. Two days later, a shop employee called and said he was clear. He returned and purchased a nine-millimeter pistol that now sits in a living room drawer, its clip loaded but out.
Credit Nick Keppler & David Smith / 100 Days in Appalachia
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100 Days in Appalachia
“This coronavirus thing has spurred anxiety for me,” said Bodner, a 34-year-old self-described “leftist” who works in digital marketing, “fear of the unknown. What if this goes on for months?”
“I grew up poor and I am aware of how desperate poverty makes people,” he adds.
Bodner says he has shot guns with friends and “isn’t freaked out by them,” but he doesn’t know quite how to handle his new weapon. “I would like to get proper training. I would like to get a concealed carry [permit]. I would like to get more practice at a range. I practice the pistol grip. I watch a lot of YouTube videos.”
Rowe, co-owner of Allegheny Arms and Gun Works, says that he tries to guide first-timers to classes but many are not meeting, cancelled like everything else because of coronavirus.
With the store swamped in March and limited to 30-minute appointments in April, he hasn’t been able to have as much time as he’d like to speak to first-time buyers about instructions, safe storage and buying the gun most sensible to their needs and abilities.
“At the end of the day, gun stores are in business to sell guns, but I want to get the correct gun to customers,” said Rowe. He added that he’s turned away people who don’t seem to have thought through safety considerations.
Austin B., a recent first-time gun buyer in Louisville, Kentucky, is also struggling with the new, ever-shifting societal paradigm.
In March, the 40-year-old husband and father bought a M&P Shield 2.0 pistol, his first gun, due to fears coronavirus could lead to increased crime. “We live in a lower-income neighborhood that has a bit of a drug problem,” he said. “With incomes being suppressed, I’d hate for there to be a rise in burglaries.”
He asked to use only his last initial for this story because he fears someone may “swat” him (make false reports of a dangerous armed person to elicit a heavy police response) due to his gun ownership.
“I’m actually pretty embarrassed about how little research I did on the subject,” he said. “I think I basically googled ‘reddit good pistol for conceal carry’ the night before I bought it and it was a popular reply.” Because Kentucky does not require a license to carry a concealed gun he’s been wearing it to work, trying out different holsters to see which “feels” right.
But it’s not loaded. He can’t find nine-millimeter bullets. Kentucky is the only Appalachian state that has not seen an increase in background checks related to gun sales amidst COVID-19, possibly because the state already had a high gun ownership rate. But people have been snatching up bullets, Austin has found, which means he can’t go to a range to train with it.
“I think I’m going out to some land my cousin owns this weekend to put some rounds through it,” he said. He hopes his cousin has some nine-millimeters to spare.
The federal Transportation Security Administration said Wednesday that the number of guns found at West Virginia airports nearly doubled last year.
The agency on Wednesday said officers stopped 18 firearms at airport checkpoints last year, up from 10 guns in 2018. The Tri-State Airport and Yeager Airport accounted for most of the weapons.
Travelers can be criminally charged or face civil penalties from the TSA for bringing guns to airport checkpoints.
Firearm permit holders can put their guns in checked bags if they follow TSA guidelines.
Nationally, the TSA found more than 4,000 firearms at airport checkpoints last year, which amounted to about 12 per day. Nearly all the firearms were loaded.
About 100 West Virginia University faculty and students gathered outside of Woodburn Circle Thursday afternoon to voice their concerns about a so-called “campus carry” bill making its way through the West Virginia House of Delegates.
Under current law anyone in West Virignia over the age of 21 can apply for a concealed carry permit. Individuals between the age of 18-20 can apply for a provisional permit. Colleges and universities have the jurisdiction to decide whether to permit concealed firearms on campus.
House Bill 2519 would allow individuals, including students, who have a permit to conceal carry a gun to do so on campus with some exceptions. If passed, the bill stipulates concealed firearms would not be allowed in on campus daycares, dorm rooms and organized events in spaces with the capacity for more than 1,000 people.
Delegates earlier this week voted to bypass the bill’s second reference to the House Finance Committee and send it straight to the House floor, but changed course Thursday. Judiciary Chair John Shott, R-Mercer, moved to commit the bill to the Finance Committee. That motion was adopted on a voice vote. HB 2519 has a fiscal note attached that finds full implementation of the bill will cost upwards of $11 million.
Educators and students at WVU who attended the protest came adorned with signs saying things like, “Books not bullets on campus” and “Hey Dr. Gee, what color bow tie did the NRA give you,” a reference to WVU president Gordon Gee.
HB 2519 has support in both chambers of the Legislature and from groups like the National Rifle Association.
Safe Spaces?
Credit Jesse Wright / WVPB
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WVPB
Protesters hold signs near Martin Hall on WVU’s downtown campus on Thursday, Feb. 21, 2019, during a faculty and student demonstration over proposed campus concealed firearms carry legislation.
Speaking through a megaphone, WVU Geography Professor Amy Hessl told the crowd educators across the state must speak out against the measure to lawmakers in Charleston.
“It’s time for us to stand up for what we hold sacred and we hold the relationship between ourselves and our students sacred,” she said. “No reasonable person would allow teachers to carry guns in K-12 classrooms. Neither should any reasonable person consider having faculty and students carrying arms in classrooms.”
Cynthia Gorman, an associate professor of geography who teaches courses on international human rights and migration, said she worries not only about the safety of her colleagues and students, but also about the impacts guns may have to learning environments on college campuses.
“I deal with a lot of controversial topics in the courses that I teach and I can only imagine that it could stifle conversation, important conversations that need to happen if the professor and other students are fearful about other students in the classroom and how they might react to things they don’t agree with,” she said.
A 2016 report by Johns Hopkins University found allowing guns on campus does not lead to fewer mass shootings or casualties. It could, however, make other acts of aggression or suicide more likely.
The movement to allow concealed guns on college campuses has gained momentum nationwide. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, as of August 2018, 16 states have banned carrying a concealed weapon on a college campus. In recent years, lawmakers across the country have introduced dozens of bills to allow concealed carry on campuses.
Former WVU student Jackson Wolfe was one of a handful of supporters of the bill at Thursday’s protest. He said the bill has enough provisions built in to ensure the safety of the campus community.
Credit Jesse Wright / WVPB
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WVPB
A group of counter-protesters stand next to a group of protesters near Martin Hall on WVU’s downtown campus on Thursday, Feb. 21, 2019, during a faculty and student demonstration over proposed campus concealed firearms carry legislation.
“It’s not like a bunch of yahoos out here carrying a bunch of AK-47s and stuff like that into classrooms,” he said. “So, I’d like to dispel the myth that it’s going to be like ‘O.K. Corral.’”
College Concerns
For its part, university officials say they would prefer not to have the Legislature dictating whether or not guns can be allowed on campus.
“There’s a lot of folks on our campus who are very passionate about the issue and so we’ve tried to engage in some dialogue with them and express to the Legislature on those sensitive issues that we retain our discretion on this issues to keep our campus safe,” said Rob Alsop, vice president for strategic initiatives at WVU.
The university has worked to add more protections to the current bill including lowering the size of venues where concealed firearms would not be allowed to 1,000 people and prohibiting them from dorm rooms. Under the bill, concealed weapons would be allowed in on-campus residence halls and classrooms.
Representatives from the state’s smaller institutions of higher education, including Concord University, Glenville State University and West Liberty University all oppose the legislation.
“This is my 18th year as a college president. I understand that campus safety is of primary importance and I have firsthand experience with a domestic incident at a prior college,” President Greiner of WLU said in a statment. “I’ve lived every president’s worst nightmare, and I never ever want to do that again.”
Greiner said a triple homicide at a college in Hazard, Kentucky five years ago still haunts him, and he worries violent domestic disturbances like that are only more likely given the proposed legislation. Parents, staff and many students are also opposed and he says enrollment would definitely drop if the law is passed.
A statement from Concord University said the school was opposed to the bill for many reasons including “increased likelihood of suicide, the delicate mental health of some young adults, the escalation of violent conflict, accidental discharge, and confusion in tactical situations.”
Glenville State University president Tracy Pallett pointed out that a significant concern for smaller schools is the inevitable costs associated with increased preventative safety measures such as metal detectors for sports events, lock boxes and safe rooms.
“I’d much rather use those monies to better the academic outcomes of our students,” he said.
In a statement, Marshall University President Jerome Gilbert strongly came out against the bill and guns on campus.
“The safety and security of our students, faculty and staff is of paramount importance to us and this legislation threatens the very foundation of that responsibility,” he stated.
