|
The Cold Water Shooting Club
While I was researching the history of Selma, Texas, at the main library
in San Antonio, Jo Myler, at that time the head of the library's
genealogy division, told me about her ancestor Justin Van Gordon
Anderson. He was the son of Hugh Allen Anderson and spent his early
childhood in Selma. His father was a stonemason and built the public
school there before Justin was born in February 1884. His father also
built the stone wall around their family cemetery in Selma.
Justin wrote a book about his experiences entitled Recollections and
Reflections of a Texian, published by the Texian Press out of Waco,
Texas, in 1966. In his book he relates stories about his father and
family. One of his stories is about the Cold Water Shooting Club.
Selma was made up mostly of Germans back in the 1880s. The Germans loved
to hold shooting competitions. The clubs were called Schützenvereins.
Clubs from different towns would compete against each other. Everyone knows
how Germans love their beer. However, Hugh Anderson and his
eighteen-year-old son, Kent (who was a crack marksman), didn't drink
beer and wouldn't shoot on Sundays--the usual day competitions were
held. Now, the Germans REALLY wanted to compete against these
sharpshooters, so they volunteered to change the date to Saturdays and
goodnaturedly gave up their beer to drink LEMONADE. The Cold Water Club,
as they became known by other Schützenvereins, ranked high
in the competitions, with Kent taking individual honors.
Justin
also mentions the 300-pound schoolteacher, Mr. Stuve. Evidently this
huge man made quite an impression on him as Mr. Stuve would lean his gun
on a rack to shoot at a bull's-eye 130 yards away. Justin wondered why
the rack didn't give way under Mr. Stuve's weight. Mr. Stuve was a good
shot; however, he missed the bull's-eye completely.
Another
shooter who impressed Justin was Mr. Hagenhower [sic]. Seems Mr.
Hagenhower was a skinny, leathery, little old man with a scraggly red
beard and a few gray hairs. As he was so persistent to be a member of
the club and to take his "rightful turn to shoot," the Club accepted him
on his "social grounds," not on his shooting ability. Justin volunteers
that the "man behind the dump down at the target" would hide himself
with great care when Mr. Hagenhower stepped up to shoot. Mr. Hagenhower
used a rusty old gun. One day at his rightful turn to shoot, Mr.
Hagenhower took aim and let go with a bullet. Dirt flew up in front of
the target and a rock went flying--bingo, right through the bull's-eye.
This made history with the local shooting circles and was talked about
for a long time afterwards.
Jean Heide
San Antonio, Texas
Published:
November 14,
2005
Categories
Related Handbook of Texas Online articles
Other My Texas stories by this author
| 
