In contrast to my life-long love of motorcycles, I didn’t become interested in firearms until I was in my twenties, about the same time we started a family. As our four daughters became more inquisitive my wife insisted I secure the guns. This was accomplished with a safe. We also decided it would be good to familiarize them with firearms. After all, there are millions of them in America.
The way I went about this was to make it into sort of a Daddy/Daughter date, but with gunpowder standing in for the flowers. When each of them turned seven we went for breakfast, after which we stopped at a nearby indoor shooting range for a some paper punching with a Marlin Little Buckaroo .22 rifle. Later, we took trips to an outdoor range and shot objects such as plywood. The lesson being if the bullet will penetrate wood, it will also put a hole in a person. Of course, on each trip we stressed the rules of safe gun handling.
Another important consideration was removing the lure of forbidden fruit. Our youngest constantly asked to handle the guns. I always tried to accommodate, showing her how to check and clear them each time. We never had a problem with unauthorized usage. Today, she is a career Army officer and still likes to shoot for recreation. Her sisters don’t currently have a strong interest in guns, but are glad they experienced them as kids. I’m looking forward to carrying on the tradition with my grandchildren. After all, there are a bunch of guns in the good old USA. 
