Over that span, the percentage of households with guns dropped from more than half in 1977 to just more than 30 percent in 2010. …

But then something happened in 2011. Gun ownership spiked to its highest level since 1994 — 47 percent.

The people who suddenly had more guns? Not the white males, the Southerners, and the Republicans most associated with guns. Instead they were mostly Democrats….

Either way, the increase in 2011 was the highest on record, and gun ownership levels in the East, the Midwest, among women and among Democrats were all higher than they had been in at least two decades.