When I was a kid, there were always guns around. My dad was a collector, hunter, sportsman and competitor. I would go with him to all sorts of competitions, sometimes he shot on a team (the Washington Blue Rifles), dressed up in Civil War garb and shooting carbines at plates or muskets at planks with a stripe painted on it, to try and be the first team to cut the board. Man, I can still smell that black powder. I loved the big campfires at night during those times, many a Pabst Blue Ribbon were consumed in my presence.
I went with him to Camp Perry, Ohio, and we sat in the truck and listened to the report on the radio that Elvis Presley had died. I have pictures from that week, he was thin from the cancer that would take him a year later at age 42, leaving behind a wife, a daughter and me, age 15.
He wore this leather coat for shooting, and it was HOT that summer week. He shot an M-1 or M-14 without a scope, and would get so strapped in to that coat and the sling of the gun that he could barely move. 200 yards? 600 yards? Are you kidding me? Seemed nuts. I knew he was good, but really didn't fully appreciate his accomplishments until recently.
Going through some old stuff, including scores of little trophies (looked like military medals encased in plexiglass), I came across four that he had obviously regarded as more important than the others. I did some searching, I found a letter from the Army at home and some more info online and pieced together that three of the medals represented the 'legs' of the requirement for the fourth: The Distinguished Rifleman's Badge.
I remember seeing a smaller, tie-clasp version of this medal from time to time, but never heard him really talking about it. Not until I started researching this accomplishment did I really understand how impressive it was. I think in roughly a hundred years, only about 2,000 civilians have earned that award, I have the actual numbers in a file but that's in the ballpark.
So now that I've started to re-embrace my firearm roots, I really wish I would have appreciated what he did. The records for winners is spotty and the ODCMP is asking for biographical information on winners before 1983. So I do have the opportunity to honor his achievement, both by telling his story for the record, and by - in my own way - doing what he would love to see me doing: learning, practicing and enjoying shooting.
I went with him to Camp Perry, Ohio, and we sat in the truck and listened to the report on the radio that Elvis Presley had died. I have pictures from that week, he was thin from the cancer that would take him a year later at age 42, leaving behind a wife, a daughter and me, age 15.
He wore this leather coat for shooting, and it was HOT that summer week. He shot an M-1 or M-14 without a scope, and would get so strapped in to that coat and the sling of the gun that he could barely move. 200 yards? 600 yards? Are you kidding me? Seemed nuts. I knew he was good, but really didn't fully appreciate his accomplishments until recently.
Going through some old stuff, including scores of little trophies (looked like military medals encased in plexiglass), I came across four that he had obviously regarded as more important than the others. I did some searching, I found a letter from the Army at home and some more info online and pieced together that three of the medals represented the 'legs' of the requirement for the fourth: The Distinguished Rifleman's Badge.
I remember seeing a smaller, tie-clasp version of this medal from time to time, but never heard him really talking about it. Not until I started researching this accomplishment did I really understand how impressive it was. I think in roughly a hundred years, only about 2,000 civilians have earned that award, I have the actual numbers in a file but that's in the ballpark.
So now that I've started to re-embrace my firearm roots, I really wish I would have appreciated what he did. The records for winners is spotty and the ODCMP is asking for biographical information on winners before 1983. So I do have the opportunity to honor his achievement, both by telling his story for the record, and by - in my own way - doing what he would love to see me doing: learning, practicing and enjoying shooting.