When the brave men of Lexington, Mass., poured onto the village green on the morning of the 19th of April, 1775, there were a couple of anomalies between them and the popular history of the era, as well as the bulk of American soldiery for the next 200-plus years. First, they were not “Minutemen,” which were essentially quick-reaction forces formed from the local militia, but rather the regular “trained band” of armed townsfolk, a concept that had a rich tradition in British and British-American history. Second, they were heavily outnumbered by the Royal regulars and served mostly as a speed…

00:00:01 Speaker 1: The return of gray wolves, Mexican wolves, and red wolves to the West is an unfolding history yet to play out, but it’s a watershed in the Western story. I’m dan Flores, and this is the American West. The wolf returns to the West. Stepping ashore in the early sixteen hundreds, we old worlders were bitter to discover wolves were abundant in America. That’s truly curious if you know human history, since thousands of generations of us had watched and learned from wolves for half a million years or more. Domesticated wolves were our first companion animals,…

Armed Citizen® Today In Harris County, Texas, on the night of July 3, two men got into an argument outside a business. One of the men then got into his vehicle and attempted to run over the second man. The second man fired one shot at the assailant, striking him through the windshield and causing the vehicle to crash. The armed defender remained at the scene and was cooperating with investigators; the driver was transported to the hospital but died of his injuries. (click2houston.com; Houston, Texas; 7/3/26) From the Armed Citizen® Archives – May 8, 1987 Two men entered John…

Modern manufacturing techniques have resulted in great value for the money when it comes to hunting rifles. Billet-machined aluminum and high-tech synthetic materials render rifles that are not only affordable, but accurate and good-looking, to boot. Yet hunting remains a traditional activity, and some of us just like the feel of a nice wood stock. For those purists among us, Sako has introduced its new-for-2026 Grizzly. The Sako 90 Grizzly offers a more traditional option in Sako’s premier bolt-action line. The Grizzly is based around the company’s 90-series bolt action, introduced in 2023, which is renowned for its safety, accuracy…

I purchased my Wilson Combat EDC X9 after thoroughly testing it almost 10 years ago. Through much of the last decade, it’s been my predominant EDC gun. Even though Wilson Combat has upgraded the platform over the years, I’ve liked my original X9 better than all its descendants—until now. With its new eXperior Elite pistol, the company has taken nearly a decade of refinement to the X9 platform, including what the company developed for the Division 77 P1 pistol, and has introduced a pistol that I just realized I like even more. The eXperior Elite looks very much like a…

Maggie Bassett and Shonna Dehl were camping on Sunday, July 5, in the Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming when a black bear attacked their tent.”It wanted in the tents,” Dehl told KTVQ News. “That’s all it wanted. It didn’t matter what we did.”Bassett and Dehl yelled, screamed, and even fired gunshots at the overly curious bruin. But apparently that wasn’t enough to scare it off. “It didn’t even blink,” Bassett said. “It just kind of circled around and came back at me from a different angle.”After firing a few more gunshots, the bear eventually ran off, allowing the two women…

Leonardo, a company that holds multiple surveillance-related defense and government contracts, recently introduced ELSAG SignalTrace, and its hardware is being offered as a bolt-on supplement to the more than 110,000 Flock cameras taking and storing photos of vehicles on public roadways nationwide. The technology contained within that hardware could conceivably track who has recently purchased a firearm and where they’re taking it. The SignalTrace webpage explains the system can detect cellphone manufacturer and make, audio system in the vehicle, smartwatches, wireless ear buds and more. Tire pressure monitors, laptops and iPads are also included as part of the “electronic fingerprint.”…

Armed Citizen® Today Around 5:30 a.m. on July 4, a man reportedly broke into a couple’s home in Pownal, Vt. When the couple encountered the stranger, a scuffle ensued. One of the residents shot at the man, grazing his leg and apparently ending the attack. Police transported the suspect to the hospital, where he was quickly treated, and charged him with burglary. (benningtonbanner.com; Bennington, Vt.; 7/5/26) From the Armed Citizen® Archives – May 7, 1987 An armed robber walked into a Chalmette, La., bar and demanded money from bartender Gail Ford. When she walked to the cash register and saw…

Recently, I tried to describe the Mondragón rifle to a friend, using just a few words: “A turn-of-the-20th-century semi-auto rifle, the first self-loading rifle accepted by any army, designed in Mexico, built in Switzerland and finally destined for use aboard German aircraft in World War I.” Clearly, I am not a man of few words. But in my defense, the Mondragón is a unique rifle worth talking about. Mexican artillery officer Gen. Manuel Mondragón began his firearm design career with a straight-pull, bolt-action rifle design named the Model 1893 chambered in 6.5×48 mm, a cartridge developed by Mondragón himself. Mondragón received patents…

As he notes in this episode of The Armed Citizen Podcast, Topher Field, an Australian political commentator and documentary filmmaker, spoke with us from a hotel in California. He was then at the beginning of a month-long trip across America. He had come to America on its 250th birthday to speak and meet people and to bring the message that Australia’s gun confiscation should not be used as a template for the land of the brave and the home of the free. Mostly though, in this interview he spoke of Australia and its crime problems and how, despite the narratives…