About this episode
Riding Shotgun With Charlie #246 Nolan Howard 617 Defense It took a while before I was able to have Nolan Howard on the show. In the meantime, he had stories about him and 617 Defense in the Boston Globe and he was on Bearing Arms' Cam & Co a few times. I'm glad we finally got a chance to do an interview. We've run into each other at a few events hosted by the NRA's state affiliate, Gun Owners Action League. In the fall of 2025, Nolan hosted a Friends of the NRA dinner in Boston, which I don't think ever happened before. Nolan grew up in Boston and the Metrowest area of Boston. Like many young kids, he played video games like Medal of Honor and learned about firearms through them. Having firearms in the house wasn't something they did. But when President Trump was in office the first time, he knew something wasn't right and it was probably time to learn about firearms and get into them. He went to a local shooting school, Mass Firearms School, where I cut my teeth as an instructor and started shooting regularly. He had a friend who helped, mentored, and guided him though shooting and starting 617 Defense. Being in the black community, there was a lack of opportunity to go shooting at a range. Boston is a "range desert" with only one range and zero gun stores in Boston proper. His objective was to keep others in the black informed on what is going on with the firearm community. Most of the ranges in Massachusetts are private clubs. There are only a handful of public ranges across the Commonwealth. His route to being an instructor was through the NRA's Home Firearm Safety, Basics of Pistol Shooting, and becoming a Range Safety Officer. After becoming a certified instructor, he teamed up with others and started offering classes. He's done classes in Boston, but moved onto the Mansfield Fish and Game, which is about an hour from Boston. For a while, Nolan was working with the National African American Gun Association (NAAGA). They do classes monthly for its members and keep them up to date on goings on with the political climate in the firearm community. Since we filmed this show, he's moved on and is working on his own group. We spent some time talking about Chapter 135, the law "Modernizing Gun Laws" in Massachusetts. It has been nothing but a sham. It goes after the license to carry holders and gun owners by turning them into criminals for homemade firearms and carrying pre-1994 so-called high capacity magazines. It makes the training more challenging, too, for instructors like Nolan. The new requirements have live fire, a written exam, suicide prevention, injury prevention, and disengagement training. Once the law went into effect, neither the state nor the state police had any type of curriculum for instructors. They have until April 2026 to develop this. When
