Historian Pamela Haag says there’s a mythology around American gun culture. The conventional wisdom is that since the Revolutionary War we’ve had some primal bond with our firearms. But Haag argues that our guns were once just another tool of everyday life, and that the gun industry convinced us we needed to be armed. In her latest book, she follows the rise of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company and the marketing campaign she says created our gun culture. We spoke with Haag about the story.