Project Appleseed

What a fantastic weekend and great group of Patriots that turned out. Our line was sold out! for the first time in a while. We had a Trail Life group with us this weekend and several families that filled our ranks. It's really nice to see youth and families filling our lines.

Saturday the forecast was ominous with a tropical system hanging over us. Much rain and thunderstorms were the prediction. Luckily we managed to thwart the predictions with only a little rain. In the late afternoon the sun was shining lending to the onset of summer in Florida and tropical humidity. On Sunday the heat was ON! in the late afternoon the heat index was nearing 104 with the ambient temperature at a balmy 97. The humidity was such you could drink the air. But our shooters persisted and the scores did not disappoint. With many new shooters on the line I was very impressed as the marksmanship teachings were adhered to and the groups began to tighten up.

It filled our hearts with pride as we told the stories of our extraordinary beginnings and quest for liberty to see folks paying attention and engaged. Especially when some engaging questions were asked and were answered by some of the younger of our participants.

The youth that participated this weekend were remarkable. Polite, attentive, safe, and engaged.

On Saturday we had two new riflemen and a new orange hat. On Sunday our Saturday Riflemen re-qualified showing their proficiency in addition to two new Riflemen. On Sunday quite a few shooters were knocking on the door of Rifleman and finishing the weekend no scores were under triple digits! HUZZAH! Also on Sunday one of our Instructors donated some Garand food and assisted the youth that wanted to shoot the 80yr old girl at steel hung 150yds out. BANG!...Ping! the smiles couldn't be contained.

Thank you to all who attended this weekend!

Great job, Gainesville!!!  Roster updated!

A couple of highlights for the weekend were having Tom earn his distinguished patch with an exact 240, and Gabby, shooting from bags since her rifle was nearly as long as she is tall (at 10-years old), bringing a score of 226. Although she couldn't be awarded the Rifleman patch, she did receive the seldom seen and highly coveted "Appleseed Pin". In addition, she cleared the Redcoat both Sunday morning and evening.

By the end of the day, we had worked on the prone, seated and standing positions and even completed an AQT. We rounded out the day with the second Redcoat, where three sharpshooters were able clear the target. This fine team even had more than half take out Morgan's Shingle.

Sunday morning dawned much cooler, a relief to all. We opened with a review of our safety procedures, shot a sighter to ensure everything was working correctly, then the morning Redcoat. No one lost anything from the night before, as we had another fine showing with three clearing the target again.

Oh, Coshocton. What would you be without a variety of weather? If you don't like it today, wait until you see what tomorrow will bring. It might be more of the same or something totally different.

From a high near 90 (with some humidity) on Saturday, to a Sunday afternoon where jackets were comfortable and mud became the norm. Oh, and did I mention that we closed out Saturday afternoon with a Thunderstorm warning from the Sheriff's office? If we'd waited another 5 minutes before closing down, someone might have drowned in the downpour!

The opening event for the year at Coshocton welcomed 11 shooters, all eager to drink from the fire hose of information that we were ready to share with them. We opened the day with a safety presentation, focusing on the four safety rules and the six steps to making a rifle safe. The opening Redcoat showed that the weekend could certainly be productive, as only Aramis was up to the task of clearing the entire target.