I was recently reading a book that made the claim that US gun culture was largely developed by Scots-Irish immigrants bringing over an already existing gun culture from Britain. While the relationship between the US and its guns was probably influenced by domestic factors, I’m wondering to what extent is this claim true.
Something important to keep in mind with the United States is that it's a very large, very young country. At the time of the American Revolution, it was a highly independent set of colonies living on the edge of a vast, untamed wilderness stretching thousands of miles in all directions. Self-sufficiency was the name of the game, and that included the ability to hunt and protect yourself.
Even today, much of the United States has a very low population and is the citizens are predominately condensed into a few major metropolitan areas. There are still places where police presence is limited or utterly non-existent and the only person you can rely on is yourself, which can be as commonplace as a suburb; a 10 minute response time is pretty slow if they're responding to a burglar.
While there's plenty of macho reasons for guns being so prevalent, what it all boils down to in the end is independence. It's a view that being armed and ready to protect yourself is an absolute necessity that cannot be infringed.