Chestnuts roasting by the open fire, Jack Frost nipping at your nose……oops this is the Christmas edition of the smoke report for goodness sake. Hello to all and when I went to bed at midnight Sunday the website was unavailable to post the smoke report. Thanks to Justin he got us back up and working and I really appreciate his efforts helping us keep the site alive.
Not much going on in the state of NC other than one non-registered event at the Rockingham Gun Club. 10 folks showed up and the weather was great except for overcast skies and it was tough to see those White Flyers. Tommy Brown took the top spot with David Slaydon taking the middle and Lewis Wyatt dragging up the rear. On the 2nd trap Lewis dropped 4 in a row from post 5 and was finally able to connect to post a 1. Scott Shoulars got to snickering and wound up with the same scenario a few posts later. As Lewis was tallying up the scores he commented that Scott had nipped him by one bird only to find out that 1 bird kept Scott from sharing the 27 dollars Lewis won…….
Tom Cox is stepping down from running the shoots at the Rockingham Gun Club. Tom just recently experienced some rather serious health issues and needs to pay attention to taking care of getting better. He has done a great job over the years and we appreciate his efforts. The responsibility of running the shoots is to be determined and hopefully the 2015 dates will be available in the very near future. The goal is to possibly convert the Lewis Class Shoots into BIG50 events to make every target count so to speak.
Walked into the County Courthouse a week ago and ran into an 870 that a retired GPD officer was trying to sell for widow in his neighborhood. It was an 870 All-American and upon further investigation it turned out to be a 1 of 1000 model that was built in 1974. I got in touch with Jeff Galloway and Jeff wound up making a deal to buy the gun and it should be appearing at the local gun clubs real soon. I believe he will be shooting it at the local fun shoots from time to time. It looks like it had never been shot and that is amazing for a gun that old.
The Annual Buckhorn Christmas Skeet Shoot was held Sunday before last and loads of fun was had by all. 6 folks entered the event and the high score was posted by Richard Drake, “Christmas” Karole Miller and Charley Walden. Last place honors were shared by John Miller and Jimmy “Bi-Shootual” Wilson with 17 birds broken. Karole, Richard and Charley are all Co-Keepers of the “THINK PINK” women’s event title. All was going well until post three on the second 25 when Jimmy Wilson bent over to pick up a shell he had dropped in front of John Miller. When shooting finally resumed they were hand in hand and neck in neck…….whatever they wound up tied. There was another competitor that was DQ’d by referee Bobby Hill (Hank & Peggy’s boy) for shooting too well and figuring out how to break them from low 8 with a full choked trapgun. Merry Christmas from the “Anonymous Shoot Reporter”.
Word off the mountain is that Tom Pitts is hunkered down for the winter like a house cat and only leaves the warmth of the nest to take on more supplies. BamBam is nursing an infected right elbow and has a nasty cold amidst the low 30 degree temps and blowing misty rain. Morg has been training up his hunter safety kids the right way and I heard tell he was coaching Randy “Boone” Jones in getting Randy’s new Browning combo figured out. Randy has been practicing a bunch and hopes to take a group down to the Sothern Grand in March. Tom Shelley is out catting around and living life to the fullest with his galpal. Steve Watson was spotted at the Panthers game a week or so ago with the kiddos and he is resting up after that great year he had leading all NC shooters in the high average category. The Mountain “Informer” wishes all a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS…….
I got a Christmas card from the legendary Earl Scripture the other day. It was a neat card that was a print of four folks in a sleigh with two large grey quarter horses. The last Earl sighting for me was when he was a referee at the South Carolina State Shoot. That was before the NC crew started doing all the scoring for both the NC and SC State shoots. I really enjoyed talking with him about the old days in Pinehurst and I actually had a cap that he gave me that had “Scripture” written on it. I guess the first time I ever met him at Pinehurst he was wearing a black cowboy hat, black long coat and cowboy boots. I made a mention in the card that JC had passed the 3rd of November and JC and Earl go back many years……
Pat Childers sent out the December newsletter for the newest NC Trap club the Low Country Preserve. They had 13 shooters show up and Mike Burrell broke the lone 50 straight to top all shooters. The NC shoot calendar is filled up with typical ATA format shoots and also BIG50 shoots at LCP. They are definitely going to be putting up some target numbers for 2015. I hope to get down there and shoot sometime with Dave Daily that lives in Myrtle Beach SC.. Their next registered shoot will be held December 27th and that of course is the last registered shoot for 2014 in NC…….
One of our Konne-Yaut Indians passed away last week and her name was Lindy Grant. She had battled cancer for seven years and she has attended the last 4 shoots with her husband. Her husband Joe was inducted into the Konne-Yaut’s at the Bradford Gun Club along with JC. Joe and JC broke the two top scores during their pale-face initiation phase in the main handicap on Saturday. JC got a punch from that score but only took home a pale-face runner up trophy. Lindy was a precious soul and accompanied Joe to the shoots and was a great cook also. One of the things they cooked was fish they caught local to their hometown of West Sunbury Pennsylvania. She will be sorely missed and our prayers go out to the family during this time. Thanks to Russell Tibi for sending
me the info!
Ok……that is about it for now and January is right around the corner. Dates for 2015 shoots – Buckhorn 4th – Ft. Bragg 10th – Gastonia 17th – Low Country Preserve 24th (LCP BIG50 7,14,21,28). That ought to give some of you something to do during January and don’t forget the Dixie Grand January 19-25, 2015.
Have a great Christmas and I hope that you and your family have a safe and happy holiday. I will try to get out to the club weather permitting considering I have 5 days in a row off! Hello to Hap out West, Scott up North and last but not least Lou down South and until next week…………………….Smokem