Between land-use regulations, building codes, and the Landmarks Preservation Commission, every cobblestone and corner of historic districts is under constant scrutiny. Lawyers and municipal authorities inexorably smooth out violations and variations in the streetscape. Garbagemen fine residents for putting bottle caps into the wrong color trash bag. Parking? I won’t even get into it. This is a place where you risk getting yelled at for failing to close a park gate behind you — a child might wander out.

Perhaps, then, it was a sense of rebellion that led me to sign up for a hunting course at the Metropolitan Rod & Gun Club, right in Cobble Hill on Pacific Street. Shooting — well, learning hunting safety is what we were actually doing — seemed the antithesis to the rest of Brooklyn’s regulated society. My family spends weekends upstate in Petersburgh, and I admit I had my sights on a wild turkey up there with the season opening early October. But it seemed more adventurous to get a license here. I signed up for three nights.

The room was packed with an odd cross section of Brooklyn: some beleaguered deli owners, a mom with her 14-year-old son, more than a few groups of teenage boys (some with girlfriends in tow), and a dozen or so would-be hunters including myself. Did I mention the lone Argentinian philosopher? We all shared a common goal: passing the third night’s hunter safety test. Afterwards, our paths would undoubtedly diverge quickly.

Beneath a small herd of mounted animal heads hanging from wood-paneled walls, we all listened carefully to a walk-through of basic gun anatomy, deer anatomy, and Lyme disease. The sound of shots volleying about at the shooting range 10 feet below the meeting room provided more incentive to pay attention than alarm. We focused on the images on the overhead projector, safely removed from the self-defense and sharpshooting set beneath, and daydreamed of future target-practice sessions. Four hours and two breaks later, I filed out with an armload of hunting pamphlets and my first reading assignment in 20 years. We hadn’t shot anything yet.

The second night saw the arrival of two amiable uniforms from the Staten Island office of the state Department of Environmental Conservation. Hunter safety was obviously a welcome diversion from their usual fare of solid and hazardous waste inspection. They happily answered questions on how to get a pistol permit in New York City — thankfully a deliberately difficult and lengthy process. We also learned that despite being deep in the woods, and far from Brooklyn, the most common unintentional thing shot while hunting is a house. Who knew?!

While no one brought up the vice president during the officers’ description of the hazards of the quail hunt, we did learn that turkey hunting is especially dangerous (you sit very still, in full camouflage, and make turkey noises). The deli owners avoided obvious questions of self-defense, and nervously asked questions for absent “friends” as to the legality of handguns purchased outside the city and brought in “by mistake.”

Once the officials said goodbye, the guns came out. As the class was walked through the mechanics of rifles, shotguns, muzzle loaders, and pistols, I had to quickly come to terms with my creeping desire to push my way to the front of the classroom and get a closer look. Given the context, I adapted quickly and spent the ensuing break with a semiautomatic handgun, a 12-gauge shotgun, and a philosopher’s perspective on the arbitrary logic of American hunting regulations.

If you arrived early enough the third night, you got to watch a short film on the joy of bow hunting. If you like sailboats more than motorboats, or American Indians more than cowboys, you might enjoy bow hunting. We also saw an instructional video on proper deer gutting — not a typical Tuesday-night viewing on Pacific Street. After a brief review of class material and a question and answer period (will there be a test question on muzzle loaders?), we received a multiple-choice test made up of 50 questions (at least one of them about muzzle loaders). Only after three full hours — once all had turned in their answer sheets, all tests were graded, and there was yet another question and answer period (how do you load a muzzle loader?) — were our grades passed back.

I’m not sure what most of my classmates intend to do with their certificates. Hunting within the city is now strictly prohibited, despite the growing raccoon population, the odd coyote, and disturbingly large rats, all inedible, most of which would look pretty lousy mounted on the wall at home anyway. Other than the hunters, a few would be pursuing licenses for handguns and shooting targets downstairs in the days ahead. The mother and son would be training their new hunting dog. I can only pray that the teenagers limit their activity to trying to impress their girlfriends. I’m certain the philosopher will think of something.

Possibly as interesting as this experience, is the unintended change that I’ve noticed in people I know. My friends have divided into two distinct groups: those surprised by my newfound interest in hunting and those even more surprised that bullets are flying around in a neighborhood brownstone. I’m confident the former group will come around once they’ve had some venison sausage or deep-fried wild turkey. I share a certain delight with the latter group, that we live in a city with such depth of history and diversity that you can live right next door to a shooting range. All in all, very few disapproved. Although they might simply be afraid of me now, Brooklynites are far less politically correct than you might predict.

While it’s highly doubtful that the city, much less the neighbors, would ever allow a place like the Metropolitan Rod & Gun Club to be built today, this land-use oddity contributes to our experience and understanding of the history of the neighborhood. Over the past 100 years, this block of Pacific Street has lost its marble and coal yards, and seen its carriage houses and school converted to condos. Over the past five years, Brooklyn has seen the velocity of these changes intensify at an alarming rate. Increasing property values continue to drive out noncomplying use groups as owners cash-out or become developers themselves.

Upstate, late the next morning at the Petersburgh Town Hall, my wife was printing out my first hunting license, deer and turkey tags. Next stop: the local hunt club deep in the woods of the Taconic Mountains. I love Brooklyn, but I’m ready for some hours at a Petersburgh range.For one thing, they have ample parking, no charge.

Mr. van den Bout is a Manhattan-based architect who lives in Brooklyn Heights, grew up in Texas, and now hunts in Rensselaer County.