50 years ago today, famous NRA member John F. Kennedy was assassinated by left-wing radical

By Bob Owens | 8:07 AM | November 22, 2013

50 years ago today, avid shooter and National Rifle Association Lifetime member John Fitzgerald Kennedy was murdered by a left-wing communist radical named Lee Harvey Oswald.

Kennedy was known as an avid shooter of both shotguns and rifles, and was one of the early advocates of the M16/AR15 platform. Rumors have floated around for decades that Kennedy had two AR-15s in his personal collection, and that he kept one on his boat.

“By calling attention to ‘a well regulated militia,’ ‘the security of the nation,’ and the right of each citizen ‘to keep and bear arms,’ our founding fathers recognized the essentially civilian nature of our economy… The Second Amendment still remains an important declaration of our basic civilian-military relationships in which every citizen must be ready to participate in the defense of his country. For that reason I believe the Second Amendment will always be important.” –Senator John F. Kennedy, April 1960

Bob Owens is the Editor of BearingArms.com. Bob is a graduate of roughly 400 hours of professional firearms training classes, including square range and force-on force work with handguns and carbines. He is a past volunteer instructor with Project Appleseed. He most recently received his Vehicle Close Quarters Combat Instructor certification from Centrifuge Training, and is the author of the short e-book, So You Want to Own a Gun. He can be found on Twitter at bob_owens.