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Osage Orange
Sharpshooters 2003 Updated Schedule - Online at: www.swampworks.com/OsageOrange.html Please note that the RED dates are changed from original schedule Jan 25 Sat 8 AM Dalton
Range - Reloading Clinic Plaque Ammunition
Purchase I pulled a round apart and it has about 45 grains of a stick powder that looks identical to the 2 jugs of 4895 I own. This should be GOOD ammo. It is boxer primed and the brass is reloadable. Reloading
Clinic - January 25 All the surplus 4895 powder that I ordered is spoken for. If you have not spoken for a jug and want one, I would be happy to put together another order. Contact me if interested. Cost is $83 for 8 lbs. This powder is ideal for both the M1 and the AR-15. I have a few reloading items (scale, brass trimmer…) that I don't want anymore that I will have for sale at the clinic. Do you have something you think a club member might want to purchase? Bring it January 25. Youth Business Cards,
Brochures, and Schedules Some clubs produce a business card with the club schedule on the back. Anybody have a source or method of doing that? We could use something like that. The personnel at the Dalton Range have been very cooperative and encouraging to our program. Be sure to thank them when you see them. We couldn't have the growing club that we have without their help. One thing they have mentioned is that they get a lot of folks asking about our club, and if we had a small brochure to leave on the table out at the range, it would help. Any volunteers? Raffles, Fundraising
etc. We can do the same with a jacket. Raffle off the right to purchase a leather shooting jacket ($350 including shipping) for $5 a ticket, 100 tickets only. We'll pay the bill for the winner after he or she gets the jacket. Fun Shoot Bring any rifles you want to shoot. The first two matches will be for .22 cal. Scopes are allowed. M1 or other rifles, including a scoped hunting rifle, can be used in the other matches. We'll have 2 new games for M1 rifles (or others?) One is to shoot at a blank target sheet with a $5 bill on the back side. Target is divided into quadrants. Whoever gets a bullet into the right quadrant wins the $5…there are a few twists I'll tell you about on the 22nd. The other game will be Bullet Bingo, $10 prize. Membership Bill Corcoran (417) 862-8618
wtc928f@smsu.edu Club Meeting - Dinner - January 10 (Report) We had our annual dinner meeting January 10. Most of the announcements and discussion show up someplace in this newsletter. But I have included below the "Presidents Address". I simply wanted to share with you a list of the things that our club did during 2002. And if you didn't make the meeting, maybe you are not aware of all the things this club does. Osage Orange Sharpshooters President's Report 2002-2003 Bill Corcoran January 10, 2003 In 2002 we ran 14 CMP High Power rifle matches. We had 49 different shooters compete in our matches, including juniors. A total of 180 individual matches were fired by these shooters, and at 55 rounds each, we put almost 10,000 rounds downrange. That's over 210 pounds of bullets and about 65 pounds of powder. Good job! We shoot to the west at the Dalton range, and the force applied to the berm by all those bullets might have had an impact on the spin of the earth, retarding the rate at which it spins to the east. However, Newton's third law says that an equal amount of force was applied to the shooter in an easterly direction. I know you all have a tight enough position that none of that energy was dissipated in friction, and your absorption of the recoil, therefore, kept the earth spinning at a normal rate. Good job! We also ran a few smallbore sporter matches on Saturdays, after the main high power match. If you haven't tried this shooting contest, you need to. Because we were short on time, we never got all the way through a match before our time was up. But we intend to change that, as you can see from our 2003 schedule. Organizing and running these matches takes a significant amount of work. First of all, Steve Kemm and Steve Milholland had to iron out the dates with the Dalton Range and the Springfield Benchrest Club. That takes some time. Secondly, we have to have targets, ammunition, and other disposables available. That takes money. Thirdly, at each meeting someone has to call the match and make sure things work safely. That's stress. And Fourth, at each match somebody has to get everything set up, then clean it up before we run out of time. That takes sweat. Since all four of these things are done by you, the members of this club, I thank you. Because everyone pitches in with time, money, and sweat, no one person has to carry the load all by himself. Again, thanks to all who help. During the past couple of years, members of this club have designed and executed the production of patches and decals with the club logo. The members who did this simply got the idea in their heads that it would be a good thing to do, brought it up at a meeting, and got it done. That's an important part of a volunteer club, the creativity to think of something good we can do, and the drive to get it done. If there's anything you think we can or should do, let's hear it. Bring it up and let's debate it. One of the worst things that can happen with a club is for us to stagnate. Let's keep moving ahead. The Osage Orange Sharpshooters staffed a couple of booths at the "Great Outdoors Day" celebration at the Dalton Range, and the public came and put many hundreds of rounds of ammunition down range through our rifles. I know some of you found out about our club through Great Outdoors Day. We will staff some booths again this year the last weekend in September. We also ran a small bore shooting clinic for the Dalton Range. Attendance was quite limited, but we made some friends and had a good time. Afterwards Bill Baldwin took us to Fred's Fish House, and that was a great time too. We now have approximately 60 members, and we have an increasing number of juniors. In the coming year, the focus of our club will shift a bit towards accommodating junior shooters. In particular, we have 4 Sunday afternoon .22 caliber matches set up at the Springfield Benchrest Club. I hope the time and day of these matches, as well as the lack of high power rifles booming in their ears, will make it more attractive for our young people to come out and shoot with us. Furthermore, our Saturday meetings will change a bit too, hopefully to encourage new shooters (and younger folks). We no longer try to run a .22 caliber match after the high power match. We will devote the first 45 minutes or so of each Saturday meeting to new shooter instruction, including live firing. And by the way, "old" shooters who may wish to get a few pointers, such as how to use the leather sling, are certainly welcome to participate. But we want to formally set aside a portion of our meeting time during which instruction can be carried out. Of course, during this time period members may sight-in rifles or practice, but we will be starting the usual 55 round match 45 minutes later than in past years. In addition, there should be some excess time available after the conclusion of the high power match, and during this time instruction and shooting should be possible. Finally, any juniors wishing to shoot the Saturday match with a .22 caliber can do that; we'll simply put the high power targets at 50 or 25 yards and they can shoot right along with the rest of the competitors. There are a number of other things I'd like you all to consider for the future. Maybe they don't belong in the President's report, but let me just list them right now. I think we need to think about: a huge dues-reduction for Juniors; dues-reduction for regular members; recruitment of Juniors; promotional brochures or cards; advertising our matches; charitable activities; a rifle raffle. 2002 has been a tremendous year for the Osage Orange. 2003 will be even better. Bill Corcoran (417) 862-8618 wtc928f@smsu.edu |