Hello Chris,
It is great to hear from you. The name Neal Knox always conjures up nostalgic memories for me. I was handloading before the startup of Handloader and Rifle magazines and I subscribed to both right from the start. The information I gleaned from the various articles accelerated my interest and knowledge of handloading and rifles.
As a young family man there were times I did not have two nickels to rub together. I justified the purchase of simple reloading tools by putting a lot of meat in the freezer. Before Christmas each year my wife and children would ask me for a Xmas list...the answer was always the same...subscription to H and R. From time to time Neal would tell us subscribers it is ok to be frugal and make do with what tools you had. Keep it simple...the use of the cheap Lee rifle loaders was one example. There are a few members on this website that look down their noses at the Lee tools. In some cases a Lee tool might not make the grade, but it is not fair to paint the company with a wide brush of failure.
All the back issues of magazines and indexes are squirreled away on some shelves in a corner of my rec room. It was fun to research the Lee Target Loader article by Neal and found myself spending more time reading other articles from back in the 1970s.
Neal very graciously corresponded with me on a few topics and I believe I have the typed letters somewhere. That reminds me, where are they?
Sadly, I cancelled my subscription to the magazines when John Barsness left Wolfe Publishing, but I just had to make a statement. It was an easy chair kind of comfort knowing the latest issues would have some words of common sense from John. Sorta like the feeling one had with Neal. Well all good things must come to end. Now I have to chase all over the publishing world to read Barsness. Some day, I do not know what timeline, I will be able to pull out the magazine articles by Barsness and call them nostaglic too.
Chris, thanks for starting a trip down memory lane. The best to you and yours.
Round Oak
Last edited by roundoak; 12/31/09.
