Good Ole Fashion Giveaway - Winners Posted

[Doug_M]

My grandfather willed me his W.W. Greener .22. It is a Martini-Henry style takedown with nice engraving. I had Greener date it for me and they told me it was made in 1909. My mother tells me my grandfather won it in a shooting competition in England when he was in his late teens. That would have been around 1919 so the rifle (and case with cleaning kit etc) would have been used I suppose, but was the top prize anyway. After WWII my grandfather took his family (and my 5 year old mother at the time) to Rhodesia to farm. After a little over a year they moved back to England and then shortly thereafter came to Canada. My grandfather had many firearms over his lifetime, but my Mum says that one rifle is the only one he dragged from continent to continent and the only one he kept when he finally gave them up (I would have been a child at that time and not aware).

So this brings me to my favourite firearms moment, when a couple of summers ago my parents and sister came out from BC to visit. I took them to the range naturally and they all took turns firing Grandpa's rifle. But my Mum especially, the look of joy on her face! She said she'd never actually fired it before but remembers the rifle being around (my grandparents were farmers most of their lives) and firing it connected her to her long departed (1994) dad. She thanked me for that moment, which always feels nice when you can do something for your parents. That rifle already was a family heirloom, but that day really cemented it for me as I'd never actually seen it prior to it being willed to me. Oh, and it's accurate AF!