I had a 22 caliber rifle when I was a tween. That wasn't uncommon because I lived in the country, and you pretty much needed such things to scare coyotes and wolves off the yard without hurting them. Obviously it can kill them, but you don't actually shoot them - you shoot close enough they understand the sound from your gun, and the sound on the ground right in front of them. Pretty effective.

It got jammed once, so I walked into town with it cocked open over my shoulder to get it fixed. They can't be fired when cocked open.

Nobody batted an eye. Not that people did that all the time, but everyone knew everyone, and easily figured the story would turn out more simple and mundane than the optics.

It was the early 80's and there was a lot less angst. And it was just a simple local hardware store that fixed it for me. By the 90's, that would never fly, and no hardware store would fix a kid's gun (or anyone's for that matter) in that very same town. By then you needed a Firearms Acquisition Cert, which no tween could possibly get.

I used to buy cigarettes for my mom, too. That was also legal back then.

The 80's was a sort of cross over period that way.