When settlers first arrived in America it was not the modern metropolis that it is today and they had to struggle to survive (Spitzer 2003 p7). The USA began with a violent and bloody revolution (Weiss,1996, p83). Among other things the settlers had to hunt for food and fight off Indians. Even the settlers own slaves ended up turning on them (Moore, 2002). So colonial USA developed a hunting, sporting and protection of its own land ethos (Spitzer, 2003, p8). American folklore has glorified this over the years with movies like Dirty Harry depicting that the west was won in gun battles (Spitzer, 2003, p9) .

The truth is prior to 1850 very few people owned guns because they were expensive inaccurate and hard to maintain. ''More people died in Hollywood than ever died in the real frontier'' (Spitzer, 2004, p2). Spitzer goes on to say violence in the USA was higher in the first half of the 19th Centaury than any other industrialised country, guns however had little to do with it. Eric Monkkonen (2001) found that in the years before the civil war only 14% of murders were committed with guns (cited in Beeghley, 2003 p111). The role of the gun began to change just before the civil war.

Firstly gun technology began to improve, revolvers became smaller, easier to use and maintain and most importantly came down in price. Gun companies began to market them in magazines and they became consumer items. Even the most significant gun inventions have been by Americans.

In 1835 Samuel Colt invented the revolver, which transformed a firearm from a single-shot device to a multiple-shot device (Netstate, 2005). This meant the gun could now fire a number of rounds without being reloaded each time. Then in 1893 Hiram Maxim invented the machine gun which was easy to operate and fired 500 rounds (Beeghley, 2003, p 114). It is estimated that this gun was responsible for 90% of the 31 million people killed in WW1.

The American love affair with guns had begun and in 1999 firearms were used in 65% of homicides this is a large amount considering America has more people killed by guns than any other industrialised country in the world. "This Veneration of guns with all its attendant symbolism and mythology drives a powerful and deeply felt belief that guns are not only an integral part of, but a force responsible for America as it exists today'' (Spitzer, 2003, p12).