Historical Winter Shoot

January 17, 2009

In memory of the hardships faced by friend and foe alike in the many winter campaigns from the American Revolution through present day hunting in Winter Alaska, The New Jersey Arms Collectors Club was proud to sponsor our Annual Historical Winter Shoot featuring arms used in
Winter Conflicts 1775 - 2003.

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Shooters were encouraged to wear appropriate battle dress for this occaision. We were expecting a damp, drizzly day, but were pleasantly surprised by cool, breezy but relatively dry shooting conditions. The bad weather showed up on Sunday instead of Saturday, and we had a sell-out crowd. In fact, Stan was told that several potential shooters saw how crowded the range was and left.

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As usual, Stan Gurski ran the line. When Stan had to leave the line, Jason Healy was drafted. Stan did need some assistance as there were about 40 shooters in the field.

Jeff Cohen was a great help as he brought his camper to the shoot and provided hot beverages and soup on the line. Special thanks also to Bob Weis. Bob transported all the target frames we used at Shongum up to Cherry Ridge, and because we had so many shooters, they were all used.

Initially, our main scorer, Tom Plante was not feeling well and did not plan to attend. John Fuller was doing the scoring when Tom showed up in the early afternoon. Even with Tom and John scoring we did not hand out the trophies until 5:00.

Once again, Joe Lutz provided us his magical baked beans, chili, and hot dogs. Due to the large crowd, Joe's assistant, Chuck Collins had to run to the store for more dogs and rolls. Overall it was a very fun and successfull day for all.

The matches ended by 3:00 but scoring was just completed by 5:00. Trophies were handed out and everyone went home happy.

We had so many shooters, we went through a ton of targets. We ended up shooting at both 50 and 100 yards. At 50 Yards the silhouette targes were used and at the 100 yard range the official NJACC 100 yard targets were used.

Virtually every bench was used, and we saw a lot of new faces in the shoot. Usually we shoot at 100 yards, but due to the snow conditions on the ground, we shot at 50 yards. Scores were very good this year, and some of the women returnd. However, our Sara Palin Champion from last year was unable to attend.

This year, we opted for reasonable calibers for Alaska Hunter and Polar Bear. We had several high scoring entries on these matches.

You do not have to take my word on the quality of shooting. I have copies of each winning target on line with the scores. Just click on the scores to see the target.

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