Actually it depends where you live - there are states where it is legal to hunt with black powder guns - so my grandfather had a black powder rifle and showed me how to properly load and fire it and take care of it - thus a character that came from one of those states could have that as a early firearm skill if you talked to the GM about it.
Alternatively there are a lot of Civil War re-creators in the US - who 100 percent know how to properly load, fire and take care of a black powder rifle
So again if you create a character that has a background as either a Civil War re-enactor or hunted in states that have black powder rifle seasons then you could give him or her the Early Firearm skill as one of their initial skills.
again its not really a career - its more of a specialized skill due to the characters background versus a career skill - and you would need to decide to add it as part of their initial skills as the GM - we had an American Indian player in my initial college group and he made a very persuasive argument to the GM that the bow and tomahawk (i.e. thrown axe) were weapons he grew up with and his character would be very proficient with - and thus he carried a bow and tomahawk
FYI it would be the same with people who were members of the Society of Creative Anachronism or other re-creators with weapons like swords or halberds and the like - but again you arent talking about day to day people - i.e. good luck with Joe Blow who tries to actually use a sword or halberd
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