The Barometer Online

Issue date: 10/29/08 Section: News

Media Credit: Luke Wenker Thu Le, a freshman in social science, fires a practice firearm at the Oregon State Pistol Club Tuesday evening. The club meets every Sunday and Tuesday night in the McAlexander Field House.

The Pistol Club at OSU is into guns, lock, stock and barrel. With a membership of nearly 200 students, faculty and staff the club is ready to start off the school year right.

But it's not all fun and games when it comes to working with the pistols they shoot every Tuesday and Sunday night in the southeast corner of McAlexander Field House.

With a strict code of safety before all things, new members aren't even allowed to touch a gun before going through a rigorous safety orientation.

New members arrive at 6 p.m. to read through a book on the club's rules, policies and regulations on proper conduct when handling a firearm.

"They must then watch a presentation and then also be able to demonstrate it back to us," said Eric Sundholm, a graduate student in Electrical and Computer Engineering, and club president. "Lastly new members must take a quiz at the end of the orientation and receive a 100 percent before we can record that they've been properly trained to be allowed to shoot."

And don't expect to see any machine guns at McAlexander, there are restrictions on what type of firearms are allowed in the gun range as well.

"The Gunnery Sergeant sets the caliber restriction for the range," Sundholm said. "Only .22-caliber guns are allowed"

The club welcomes new members, of all different skill levels and is proud of its long heritage on campus.

"Of the people here about 50 percent are experienced and the other half has very minimal experience with guns," Sundholm said. "We've been a club since 1948 in this same facility, and for all this time we've had a perfect safety record. And this particular facility has been around since the 1920s."

The new members were also excited to learn about pistol shooting as they lined up to test their memories of the rule book they'd just read.

"I've always wanted to try shooting. In my country - Korea - no one is even allowed to own a gun, only the army and police are allowed to use them," said C.Y. Chung, senior in Pre-Physical Therapy.

Continued...

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