Did Americans use guns to check their height after the American Revolution
Executive summary
No credible reporting in the provided sources supports the claim that Americans used guns as a way to "check their height" after the American Revolution; available sources discuss the prevalence, regulation and types of guns in colonial and early U.S. history but do not describe any practice of using firearms to measure human height (not found in current reporting) [1] [2] [3] [4]. Contemporary and historical sources in the set instead focus on militia arms, hunting weapons, and local gun laws, with debate over how widespread private ownership actually was around 1775–1783 [2] [3] [4].
1. Origins of the question: a quirky claim with no backing in the supplied record
The idea that people used guns to “check their height” after the Revolution reads like a folkloric or apocryphal image rather than an established historical fact; none of the supplied articles or essays—about Revolutionary firearms, militia equipment, or subsequent gun culture—mentions a practice of using guns as an ad hoc measuring stick (not found in current reporting) [1] [3] [5].
2. What the sources do say about firearms in Revolutionary America
Reporting and histories in the set describe a diversity of arms in colonial hands—flintlock muskets, fowlers, rifles and pistols—often irregular, locally made, or captured from the British; committees contracted standardized arms for militias because logistics required consistency, not because individuals lacked weapons for daily life [1] [3]. World History Encyclopedia summarizes weapon types and battlefield use, while American Rifleman offers museum-level details on surviving pistols [3] [1].
3. How many Americans actually owned guns at the Revolution? Conflicting interpretations
At least one source in the set contests the common myth that "most Americans" owned firearms at the Revolution, arguing that only a minority—perhaps around 10 percent of frontier settlers—had guns and that firearms were regulated and inventoried before and after the conflict [2]. That contrasts with other accounts emphasizing militia reliance on arms and the centrality of weapons in frontier and militia culture [5] [3]. The supplied sources thus present competing views on prevalence and practice [2] [5].
4. Routine uses of guns then: hunting, militia, and municipal rules—not personal measurement
Every source that discusses ordinary gun uses points to hunting, militia service, and military needs; municipal ordinances regulating storage and loaded weapons are also documented [5] [4]. The Trace piece highlights long-standing local restrictions—Boston outlawed storing loaded firearms—underscoring that guns were regulated objects of public concern rather than casual household tools you’d use for body measurements [4].
5. Why the “check your height” image is implausible in context
Period firearms were long and heavy—muskets and fowlers could be several feet long and not convenient for precise anthropometry—and sources stress their functional role in hunting and war, not domestic measurement [1] [3]. Furthermore, municipal laws and militia inventories treated guns as accountable property, which makes casual, nonfunctional use less likely to appear in the documentary record summarized in these sources [2] [4].
6. Limits of the record and what would be needed to confirm the claim
The absence of mention in these sources does not strictly prove the practice never occurred; small-scale folk habits can go undocumented. To substantiate “guns used to check height” historians would need primary evidence—diaries, household inventories, visual depictions, or ordinances referencing such a practice—which the provided materials do not include (not found in current reporting) [1] [2] [3] [4].
7. Competing narratives and hidden agendas to watch for
Be skeptical of sensational or quaint claims when primary evidence is absent. The Revolutionary War Journal piece argues strongly against a popular mythology of ubiquitous gun ownership, reflecting a corrective agenda [2]. Conversely, gun-culture histories often emphasize continuity from colonial militias to modern attitudes, which can be read as framing historical facts to support contemporary political narratives [5] [4].
Bottom line: the supplied reporting documents the types, uses and regulation of firearms in Revolutionary America but contains no evidence that Americans routinely used guns to check people’s height; to establish that would require primary sources that these materials do not provide [1] [2] [3] [4].