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The most famous sniper in the history of the United States Marine Corps had his humble beginning in Geyer Springs, Arkansas on May 20, 1942. He grew up in rural Arkansas, living with his grandmother after his parents separated. He took to shooting and hunting at a young age, partly out of necessity to help feed his poor family. As a USMC sniper in Vietnam, Hathcock was so good that the North Vietnamese Army even put a bounty of $30,000 on his life for killing so many of their men. He tallied up a service record of 93 kills (and those are just the confirmed ones) but it would be just one that he would be really famous for: In 1967 Hathcock set the record for the 20th century's longest combat kill, hitting his target at the then-unheard of distance of 2,286 meters or 1.42 miles. The record held firm for 35 years until 2002, when it was broken by a Canadian sniper during Operation Anaconda in Afghanistan. Read (and watch) more about the Gunny here...

On this day

[more] What else happened today

1706 — American gunsmith and soldier Seth Pomeroy was born in Northampton, Massachusetts. 1772 — English inventor and rocket artillery pioneer Sir William Congreve was born in Kent. 2000 — NRA president Charlton Heston tells Al Gore, "from my cold dead hands" in a speech at the 129th NRA convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. 2004 — Canada: The Liberal government, just days before an expected election call, eliminates fees for registering and transferring firearms. Ottawa says it will also limit its spending on the gun registry to $25 million a year, spending that has averaged $33 million a year and reached as high as $48 million. Licensing of gun owners and firearms will continue. 2005 — Colt Defense LLC completed its acquisition of Diemaco, which now operates as Colt Canada. 2009 — The injunction blocking the implementation of concealed carry within National Park Service lands was overturned by the passing of an amendment to (of all things) the Credit CARD Act of 2009, added by Senator Tom Coburn (R, OK) over the wailing protests of the Brady Campaign.

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