Trap Shooting in Paradise

On my 10th birthday my father and his brother, my Uncle Chuck, took me to Sears and Roebuck (the Roebuck was still there in those long ago days) and bought my birthday present, a single shot, bolt operated 22-caliber rifle. I still have it. After a detailed lecture about gun safety, several dry runs with loading, aiming and pulling the trigger. A target was set-up 20 to 30 yards away, and I loaded, locked, safety off and I fired. I had a respectable 3rd ring 22-caliber perforated target.

I cleaned the rifle, found a secure place in my bedroom for this real, truly real, rifle. At my father’s direction the ammunition was kept downstairs in a cabinet drawer. Several weeks later, and more target practice, my Uncle Chuck, who was following my progress, said let’s go squirrel hunting, and the next Saturday morning off we went. I was delighted to be hunting with my Uncle Chuck.

We easily found a target, a gray squirrel, bushy tail waving, and about 30 yards up in a tree. Uncle Chuck said the magic words, “Shoot him, Mike”. Safety off, I sighted and fired. The squirrel twitched slightly, apparently unfazed. “Hell, Mike, you missed him”. Just at that moment the squirrel toppled off the branch and thumped into the ground about 15 feet in front of us and quite dead. I was thrilled. I was a big game hunter and Uncle Chuck was smiling. I picked up the squirrel and turned to hand it to my uncle who just said, “Keep him, he’s yours”. We scored three or four more squirrels and went back to Gramma’s house.

Then came a most terrible moment: again attempting to hand the squirrels to my uncle, he only said, “clean ‘em”. What! I don’t clean them, I shoot them, and sometime later they appear in a squirrel stew. Not so. The cleaning and preparing is the hunter’s responsibility. Here was another lesson for the junior big game hunter, and not much fun. I got to work, mumbling under my breath about the cruelty of life in general and my uncle in particular. Somehow that night squirrel stew was served and it was delicious.

About here WWII arrived and Uncle Chuck left and was gone almost five years. When he returned we picked up where we had left off. Uncle Chuck became a local Skeet Shooting Champion. I was a regular at the trap shooting range and I took a few turns at skeet; I didn’t do very well, but not for want of trying. By this time I was using a pump twelve, which I owned and occasionally a lighter skeet gun my uncle loaned me.

A few years later I was a 3rd Class Midshipman with the Navy, it was July of 1950 and our summer cruise had taken us to Pensacola. Then the Korean toss-up began and at morning quarters we were told “We’re at war. The Navy can use pilots, any of you want to take a try at it?” God doesn’t make many smart 19 year-old boys and I was no exception to that rule so, of course, I stepped forward along with most of my battalion.

Along the path of Wings of Gold was aerial gunnery and the principles of aerial gunnery included leading your target and glory be, trap shooting was part of it. I was a star. I was on a shooting platform and I felt comfortable for the first time. I had a very respectable 13 out of 15 birds first time up. I was a star and the wonder of my wing mates, most of whom had no exposure to target shooting, let alone trap shooting. I sent a letter to Uncle Chuck, and of course mentioned my stardom. Chuck wrote back and said, “Don’t forget, you were always a little late with the bird moving to your right”. Damn! Each of my misses had been just that, the bird moving to my right. The keen marksman that Uncle Chuck was, he remembered his nephew’s flaw.

Uncle Chuck and I corresponded sporadically after that and we still did a little shooting when I was home on leave. I flew the Corsair for the Navy in Korea but got bummed up a little. So I decided to try a new career, resigned and went to medical school.

I received a phone call about 25 years later and it was from Uncle Chuck. We had intermittent contact in the interim, so it wasn’t a surprise but I could tell things weren’t quite right. Uncle Chuck said, “They say I’ve got the big C”. He described what the doctors had told him, the type of tumor, and he said it was in his lungs and liver.

My heart sank. He asked me if there was anything else he could do. He had never married, and always treated me as his son. I couldn’t lie to this man, and I didn’t need to. I said they’re doing everything they can for this disease. He said, “OK Mike, thanks”. Three months later he was dead.

At his funeral he had chosen to be buried in his Naval uniform, that of a Chief Petty Officer. This man had served in the Navy during WWII having lied about his age. He was several years over the age limit. On his uniform I saw the ribbon for the Navy Cross with an Oak Leaf Cluster. He had never mentioned the decorations or the story behind them. In his will he left me his skeet gun.

If there’s trap and skeet shooting in Paradise, and there has to be, Uncle Chuck is the Champ.