Nickle

I was immersed in the gun culture at a very early age, as I grew up in a gun shop. I started shooting competition (Bench Rest, Heavy Varmint class) at around 13 years old. Unlike most people, my eyes were always open. I bought my first rifle that was truly my own in Dec 1968, the day prior to GCA 68 going into effect, and I was the ripe old age of 14. It was totally legal for me to do that, as I had my father’s consent. I joined the Army at 17, did 10 plus years there, still shot some, and my interest went more towards Battle Rifles, though I still had an interest in accurate bolt action rifles.

When I got out of the Army, I enlisted into the Army National Guard, and am still in today. I’ve become one of my Battalion’s primary marksmanship instructors. My primary employment is as a civilian employee (currently a supervisor) with the VT Army Guard, running a vehicle maintenance shop.

Now, how I got even deeper into Battle Rifles, I’ll attribute to none other than President Bill Clinton and the ’94 Assault Weapons Ban. I saw the writing on the wall, and figured it was past time to start buying what I had wanted to buy for quite some time already. My kids were almost done school and on their own, and I was in decent financial condition. So I started buying, and got digging deeper into Shotgun News for accessories. I had given up on finding a decent priced M1A, and had bought an FN-FAL, among other rifles. Well, there was this crusty old curmudgeon that was selling M14 stocks, and he also had ammo repack kits and some really nifty 25 meter targets, as well as other items, like slings. So I did business with him (mid to late 1990’s, mind you), and we started e-mailing back and forth from time to time. I guess most of you can figure out who the crusty old curmudgeon was by now. Over time, I found a decent price M14 clone, early Fed Ord, 4XXX range, all USGI parts except the receiver (eat your heart out Fred) along with an AR, an M1 and a bunch of other stuff, even an AK and a PSL (Romanian “Dragunov”).

Over time, his local club ran into the inevitable club politics that happens to so many clubs. So, they reformed themselves, and RWVA was born. Now, I was way too far away to take advantage of that fine new organization, but I followed their progress. Soon, they were running training programs, a new thing called Appleseed. Problem was, they were all way too far for me to handily travel to. So, I figured, if I can make it to them, maybe I can find a range, and bring them to me. In the course of arranging a local range, and all of this, I joined FAL Files, and bumped into some local guys that were doing pretty much the same thing at one of the local clubs that RWVA was doing, though a much smaller scale. Monday evenings, they would get together to shoot AQT’s. I could take a little advantage of this, as I had every other Monday off. I joined the Appleseed forum, and started getting things lined up to bring Appleseed to the Northeast US.

Well, in the time it took me to get that nice original range (Jericho, a 600 yard range) all lined up, the program had come closer to me than before, and I had made it to an event. This was April 2007. I ended up helping out Fred on his end of the line, due to the range being split in 2, the Shoot Boss was a fairly new Red Hat named The Guy. I was made an IIT at the end of the event, and off on the trail I went. My next event (Van Etten, NY, May 2007), the 2 Red Hats that I was supposed to be working with both couldn’t make it, so I ended up being the only Instructor there. Yup, first time IIT and I was the Shoot Boss. Fortunately, I did have a fair amount of experience running ranges and teaching people how to shoot (thanks to my employer, the US Army). I survived that, and a month and a half later, at my next Appleseed (Proctor), I’m working with Fred again, and I get my Red Hat at that event. Yeah, Fast Tracked, but I had to work for it, and it technically was my third Appleseed worked. The story from there can be found by checking the AAR’s on the forum.

Over all of this time, I was still involved in the family ammo manufacturing business and gun shop. Well, last year, my father lost his twin brother and his wife (my Mom). So, between the 2 deaths, he lost interest in the business, after spending much of his time caring for her, then visiting her while she was ill. January this year, he hands the business over to me, a year early. The fact that I didn’t go to Afghanistan as planned had a lot to do with the timing.

As to what Nickle is up to these days:

Master Instructor and Steering Committee member with RWVA’s Project Appleseed. I’ll continue as long as the program will have me.

Army Guard NCO, and Shop Chief of a maintenance shop. I retire early next year, 39 years military service, just under 36 creditable as a civilian employee.

Owner of Green Mountain Ammo Company. When I took the business over, we agreed to change the name. Slowly cranking it up and we’ll crank much faster after I retire from the Guard. We specialize in obsolete, foreign military and hard to get ammo now, expanding the line to premium match ammo in a few popular calibers. We still do all the usual stuff.