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Posted on 10/15/2003 10:33:07 AM PDT by jdege
Posted on Wed, Oct. 15, 2003
BY SAM COOK Knight Ridder Newspapers
SOLON SPRINGS, Wis. - (KRT) - Eric Meitzner turns the small pistol in his hands, examining it silently.
Jim Beaulier has driven an hour from Duluth to Meitzner's gunsmithing shop near Solon Springs with the handgun. It's an old German gun, and Beaulier would like to clean it but can't figure out how to take it apart.
He has come to the right man. Meitzner, 51, has earned a reputation as an excellent gunsmith, and he draws customers from all over northern Minnesota and northwestern Wisconsin.
[...]
"I don't know if people in this area realize what a treasure we have in him," says Pat Kukull, owner of Superior Shooters Supply in Superior. "Whether it's a gun that's 50 years old or 2 years old or 100 years old, there's nothing that stumps him. We have yet to baffle him."
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"I'm a craftsman," Meitzner says. "I use that as kind of a generic trade description. And I like to shoot. I've always been fascinated by what makes guns work and all the different kinds."
[...]
Meitzner opened his spacious shop among the maples in rural Solon Springs 8 years ago. It is a model of orderliness, every tool in its place, not an iron filing or a scrap of wood on any working surface. His machines_six polishers, a milling machine, a lathe, a welder_are spotless.
Rows of books stand straight and tall on shelves: "Wildcat Cartridges I & II," "The Winchester Book," "Metals Handbook," and back issues of "The Double Gun Journal," to name a few. To streamline field-testing of guns, he merely opens a hinged section of wall and fires into the woods at targets up to 100 yards away.
[...]
Meitzner grew up in Superior and watched his grandfather work on guns in a small machine shop.
"When I saw that, it really grabbed me," Meitzner recalls.
While serving with the Marines in Quantico, Va., in 1972, he volunteered at a local gunsmith shop off the base. He eventually worked there full time for 2 years before attending gunsmithing school at Trinidad State Junior College in Trinidad, Colo.
After attending school, Meitzner worked for a couple of years with the late Don Allen, founder of Dakota Arms in Sturgis, S.D. Finally, he was ready to open his own shop.
"To be in the business that long and not step on anybody's toes is amazing," she says. "He's a real gentleman of the gun world."
(Excerpt) Read more at bayarea.com ...
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FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794
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It is in the breaking news sidebar! |
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Too bad the Mercury News doesn't have a "FREEDOM" section or a "CONSTITUTION" section.
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