When Bryce Andrews was a kid growing up in Seattle, he always admired Montana-born cowboys, and men who rope and herd cattle. So when he finally drove over the Cascades and settled in Montana as a young, do-it-all cattle rancher working under an endless blue sky, he knew he’d found his place. But then he was gifted his grandfather’s Smith and Wesson .357 Magnum revolver, a weapon that fascinated him as a little boy and haunted him as a man living alone on a desolate cattle ranch an hour’s drive from civilization.

On this episode of Paternal, Andrews discusses how he came to carry his grandfather’s gun, what he’s learned about the violent nature of life on a cattle ranch, and, in the wake of becoming a father himself, what one man can do with a treasured inheritance so closely tied to a history of violence.

Andrews is the author of the 2023 memoir Holding Fire: A Reckoning with the American West, available wherever you buy books.

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