A barrage of sharp shooting generations and a Commonwealth Games competitor have been produced by The Wood Smallbore Rifle Club during its 100-year history.
The club, which is currently based at Saxton Field but has also been situated near Trafalgar Centre, celebrated its centenary target on 2 March with a cake cutting attended by current and former members.
President Tim Gladstone says the 40-member club, whose members range from teenagers to those in their early 90s, had remained a venue for social and competitive target practice since it opened fire in 1924.
“It was one of a number of clubs that operated in Nelson and we’re down to five clubs now, it had provided entertainment and competition shooting between the men and women in Nelson at the time,” he says.
“Back in those days, target shooting was quite a popular pastime and that worked all the way through all the war years especially, and after the war years with returned servicemen coming back, many of them wanted to carry on their target shooting in some form or another.
“Into the 50s, 60s, and 70s clubs grew, and The Wood club was at that time also quite strong in teaching young children and adults how to shoot, whether that be cadets or young farm kids.”
Tim says many members had represented the district and New Zealand including Kevin Barton, current Target Shooting Nelson president Rachel McLaren, and Dayle Slinn, who competed at the 2002 and 2006 Commonwealth Games.
He says the Barton and Slinn families had remained the club’s big guns and other generations had also been auxiliary to the club’s long range.
“I would like to think that we can go on for another 100 years, but our future plans are to just take each season as it comes,” Tim says.
“We always attract a healthy number of members that come back every season and we look forward to the 2024 season,” he adds.
“We’ve got a fantastic range which is fairly new; we have futureproofed our sport here in Nelson, the Saxton complex is a fantastic complex… we’ve got strong support in our club, and we’re looking forward to the next 20 years at least.”
