imashooter2
02-19-2013, 12:52 AM
I was over at my Father's place tonight to take him over to the diner as is our Monday habit. Pop turned 85 last December and no one knows the day or the hour, if you know what I mean. All of his brothers and his sister passed at 85 and sometimes it's tough to see the iron man that raised me turning frail. :sad: Anyway, after dinner we went back to his place and were talking a bit. We got on the subject of his basement, which he is having parged. Suddenly he brightens up and says that while the workmen were cleaning out and moving 55 years of accumulated stuff they found some lead and would I like to take it. Well sure I would! So we talk a little longer and I'm ready to head on home so I pop down to get the lead. It was just a little pile, but the memories it brought flooding back...
Pop got out of the Navy in 46, married my Mother in 48 and bought that house in 57, closing on it while my Mom was in the hospital after giving birth to me. Pop was on the line gang for Ma Bell at the time and they both shot on the Bullseye team at our local range along with my Grampa and Aunt Jessie. Well a telephone man with 3 kids doesn't have a whole lot of spare cash and having access to a bit of cable sheath, he started casting. By the time I was old enough to help he had a huge pile of sheath under the back porch. There was so much lead coming in that he had to tell his buddies to stop dropping it off. We poured literally tons of it into H&G 50s to keep the family shooting through the 60s. We shot up a bunch ourselves and traded still more for powder and primer. Then in the early 70s job pressure and another expensive kid added to the clan made him give up competition and we drifted away from shooting and into scouts and camping and other family activities. We still shot some, but not like the 60s and the casting gear got put away as we had plenty to last us already cast. Time marches on...
About 25 years ago, Pop built an addition on the back of the house and that pile of sheath under the porch had to go. I took about 600 pounds of it home with me and the construction guys carried the rest of it, way over a ton... maybe over 2 tons, into the dumpster during the demolition. Now I know what you're all thinking. But 25 years ago, 600 pounds was a lot of lead to me. I didn't shoot competitively, and frankly that cable sheath wasn't as good for my use as the WW that every gas station in town was more than happy to have Bob carry out to my car for me. It was a different time and I never gave building a stockpile a thought. Free lead was everywhere. Fast forward 15 years and I'm an action shooting junky casting a couple hundred pounds a year to feed my habit and free lead is getting more than a little scarce. I've scrounged a fair pile since then, but I sure would like a 2nd chance at Pop's back porch.
So here we are back to tonight and 29 pounds of 1960s cable sheath has me getting all misty and thinking of times past and a future not far off...
Pop got out of the Navy in 46, married my Mother in 48 and bought that house in 57, closing on it while my Mom was in the hospital after giving birth to me. Pop was on the line gang for Ma Bell at the time and they both shot on the Bullseye team at our local range along with my Grampa and Aunt Jessie. Well a telephone man with 3 kids doesn't have a whole lot of spare cash and having access to a bit of cable sheath, he started casting. By the time I was old enough to help he had a huge pile of sheath under the back porch. There was so much lead coming in that he had to tell his buddies to stop dropping it off. We poured literally tons of it into H&G 50s to keep the family shooting through the 60s. We shot up a bunch ourselves and traded still more for powder and primer. Then in the early 70s job pressure and another expensive kid added to the clan made him give up competition and we drifted away from shooting and into scouts and camping and other family activities. We still shot some, but not like the 60s and the casting gear got put away as we had plenty to last us already cast. Time marches on...
About 25 years ago, Pop built an addition on the back of the house and that pile of sheath under the porch had to go. I took about 600 pounds of it home with me and the construction guys carried the rest of it, way over a ton... maybe over 2 tons, into the dumpster during the demolition. Now I know what you're all thinking. But 25 years ago, 600 pounds was a lot of lead to me. I didn't shoot competitively, and frankly that cable sheath wasn't as good for my use as the WW that every gas station in town was more than happy to have Bob carry out to my car for me. It was a different time and I never gave building a stockpile a thought. Free lead was everywhere. Fast forward 15 years and I'm an action shooting junky casting a couple hundred pounds a year to feed my habit and free lead is getting more than a little scarce. I've scrounged a fair pile since then, but I sure would like a 2nd chance at Pop's back porch.
So here we are back to tonight and 29 pounds of 1960s cable sheath has me getting all misty and thinking of times past and a future not far off...