SMITHFIELD -- Vickie Jordan and her husband, Eddie, were all set to open a gun store in Smithfield, but they were missing one thing: the name. "I went to bed one night and was real apprehensive because we couldn't come up with a name," Vickie Jordan recalled.
When she finally got to sleep, she said, she dreamt that God told her to name it after the Second Amendment - the constitutional right to bear arms - but to call it the Second Amen-ment Gun Shop.
"I said, 'All right, Lord, I get the picture,'" Vickie Jordan said.
The name fit well: Her husband is an evangelist and pastor of Faith Baptist Church in Selma. And when he's not preaching, he can be found at the shooting range with his son, Blake, who manages the new store.
"A lot of people make fun of me - a Bible in one hand, a .44 in the other," Eddie Jordan said. "I sort of turned a hobby into a business."
The Second Amen-ment Gun Store opened last month at 106 Ava Gardner Ave., off of North Bright Leaf Boulevard. It's among the few places in Johnston County to buy a handgun. Walmart sells guns for hunting, the Jordans said, but the big retailer doesn't have handguns, which have proven popular with customers seeking a weapon for target practice or protection.
Second Amen-ment also has a full line of shotguns, rifles and sights for hunting, and the Jordans are planning to get turkey guns in time for turkey-hunting season. The store also sells ammunition and can do special orders as well as legal transfers of weapons purchased online.
"We want to make it a one-stop shop for all hunters and shooters," Eddie Jordan said. He hopes to attract the large number of people who obtain concealed-carry permits from the Johnston County Sheriff's Office.
Eddie Jordan said he wants to send his son to gunsmithing school so the business can offer repairs as well as sales. In the long term, he envisions opening a shooting range.
