It has been since January 2018 since we have had a Winterseed in Maryland and the forecast all week looked good promising. And we got all that was promised - temperatures in the 20s, freezing rain, snow, rain, wind, really everything but sunshine. It made the answer at the start of the clinic for "where and where was the American Revolution won?" - "Valley Forge" - seem ironically appropriate, if incorrect.
Despite the conditions, it was a sold-out shoot with a great group of youth and parents from the Ft Meade area, including a father/daughter in period dress, two other father-son combos, and a lot of beginners, several of which had never handled a firearm before. With a great showing from our instructor corps and AppleCore team, we were able to provide a lot of individualized instruction and coaching to create a safe and productive shoot.
In the end, we awarded two Winterseed patches, one to Quientin A with a 226 and one to Josh W with a 229. Considering the conditions and the number of malfunctions that were accumulating during the event, these are extremely good scores. No cleared rascally Red Coats this time, but many people were off by only one shot.
We are very excited to have more participants from the Ft Meade youth group at future shoots - thanks for all the support and participation!
Special thanks to our instructors and volunteers for braving the weather: CatGravity took the lead as Line Boss to help out an ailing Shoot Boss; Etervigila took on the history with short notice and got rave reviews; AppleCore member Liberty Boy and IIT Agent711 worked hard with brand new shooters and helped them build confidence; and BeSwift, as always, is our fearless state leader and worked on his eleventy millionth shoot in the freezing cold.
Pictures are available on our Maryland Appleseed Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/pg/Project-Appleseed-Maryland-264406060313831/photos/?tab=album&album_id=2716787875075625&__xts__%5B0%5D=68.ARBOQOZl9avIPSqOvp4bf2qY8ROo8is3YBlDJSAf2WCHl4zxTgZvUSnXo27-nGPpd7DgeULOt4bYL0KKDIfizr6aKTyFgyeZZwyIJqXliMy9oRv0vFP4jsiuS-BGo-epH769lp-xJYSyR9FlP4_iY2wIOhKY9Vsgq-4VepD_rdQyWzvGKQcYRdkF7suM7tfSg1YBQvUTuutZf9dkqHxHC0xD96LSIbq7HTwrfU0rs5--BpHB_ReE2jdR47zglyZEvA020fWrtu5gp_BQ0MWhYoDOK3m83dKhPLJXz4e8CrnN6n_HRYDbGXTRaFDBsizKcxV5Daokw0JejguZpKmpnYohUUX8njO4XNXH5Ot52img1dpeuSHV3F5dAuhuRlSVfq3e1kktYr8qz8tpcuD34XJ5k8A3L-hNZjTgaJ4IrySKXkXjC2RTfNAm_o0KX8h1fNU2kd0PRMTzEdOgAlN2&__tn__=-UC-R