Griff Murphey
04-10-2013, 05:14
I was Okinawa for a year and there was a good deal about buying guns from Winchester Hong Kong. I assumed the guns would be sent to Okinawa but I was kind of surprised when I heard from my parents that the guns came to my home of record. When I got home my dad had put them in the stocks for me (slightly buggering up the guard screws). I still have the match target M-70, I got rid of the .270 sporter which I was very dissatisfied with, having no real magazine, just a hollowed out area in the stock!
Finished up at Pendleton. I only ordered one gun and that was an M1858 rifle musket by Parker Hale. An 1853 3-band came in by mistake. Well, I took it anyway.
I thought I would order an Auto Ordnance Semi Auto Thompson.... I thought yeah it is a kind of dumb, useless gun, but at least it would represent the real one in my WW-2 collection. The manger, a retired USMC LT. COL. Would not order it for me because in his view it was "too dangerous." It is funny how people think... Being a Marine officer you would think he would have the sense to understand that even a pump shotgun was at least as "deadly." So I bought a "200 years of freedom" Mini-14! LOL!
Also bought a Ruger Old Army muzzle loading revolver and used to drive to San Diego to shoot with the San Diego Muzzle Loaders. I and some other guys set up a few matches through the Santa Margarita Gun club. It was a great post for shooting, I was up at Camp Horno and they regularly held "rec fires" passing out free .38 and .45 ammo. We even had a "light combat rifle" match for M-16s and ARS, I think we had three teams enter and my gun was the only privately owned one.
I had some dental techs who wanted to get their Rifle ribbons and I found a unit at Horno who loaned me rifles and I scrounged ammunition. I had to get a radio to talk to Range Control. A marine major who lived in my apartment complex saw me with that PRC-25 and said, "Doc, what're you doing with that radio... You don't know how to use that thing!" So I sat down and taught him a quick RTP class on it courtesy of my 7 years of Army ROTC. He blinked and said, "You DO know how to use that thing!"
Over lunch I would put on utilities and drive up to range 214 and they would squad me in, they would by then be at 500 and the young Marines were kind of freaked out by the M-1. A great post for shooting hobbies, at least in 1975-76! Not sure about today.
Finished up at Pendleton. I only ordered one gun and that was an M1858 rifle musket by Parker Hale. An 1853 3-band came in by mistake. Well, I took it anyway.
I thought I would order an Auto Ordnance Semi Auto Thompson.... I thought yeah it is a kind of dumb, useless gun, but at least it would represent the real one in my WW-2 collection. The manger, a retired USMC LT. COL. Would not order it for me because in his view it was "too dangerous." It is funny how people think... Being a Marine officer you would think he would have the sense to understand that even a pump shotgun was at least as "deadly." So I bought a "200 years of freedom" Mini-14! LOL!
Also bought a Ruger Old Army muzzle loading revolver and used to drive to San Diego to shoot with the San Diego Muzzle Loaders. I and some other guys set up a few matches through the Santa Margarita Gun club. It was a great post for shooting, I was up at Camp Horno and they regularly held "rec fires" passing out free .38 and .45 ammo. We even had a "light combat rifle" match for M-16s and ARS, I think we had three teams enter and my gun was the only privately owned one.
I had some dental techs who wanted to get their Rifle ribbons and I found a unit at Horno who loaned me rifles and I scrounged ammunition. I had to get a radio to talk to Range Control. A marine major who lived in my apartment complex saw me with that PRC-25 and said, "Doc, what're you doing with that radio... You don't know how to use that thing!" So I sat down and taught him a quick RTP class on it courtesy of my 7 years of Army ROTC. He blinked and said, "You DO know how to use that thing!"
Over lunch I would put on utilities and drive up to range 214 and they would squad me in, they would by then be at 500 and the young Marines were kind of freaked out by the M-1. A great post for shooting hobbies, at least in 1975-76! Not sure about today.