woodwzrd
Member
My son gifted a 7.62x51 (308) bullet pen, that I helped him make a couple of weeks ago, to his civics teacher who served in the Army in the 80's which ended up having a bit of a snowball effect. His teacher was thrilled with the pen which initiated a conversation about making some pens for an upcoming Veteran's breakfast event, March 3rd, that he organizes along with a group of students.
Each year this organizations serves free breakfast to any Veterans in our county followed by a short ceremony where they honor a different group of Vets. This year they will be honoring those who served in the Persian Gulf. Initially he was talking about 125 pens, which I really could not commit to because of the timing and lack of funding for the organization to purchase that many pens. It was then scaled back to 50-60 pens which still proved to be a funding issue. Through further discussion he he decided to order 4 pens to honor four Veterans that will be receiving Lifetime Service awards. One of the Vets is a very healthy and active WWII Vet. Another is a Korean War Vet and the remaining two Vets served stateside in the 60's. Al of these men are rather active in our community as well as local Veterans organizations.
All of the pens are made with vintage spent military brass. The WWII Vet will be receiving a pen made with a 30-06 casing stamped out in 1943. The Korean war Vet will receive a pen made with a 30-06 casing stamped out in 1954 and the remaining two pens are made with 7.62x51 (308) casings stamped out in 1965. All are toped with walnut tops which was the typical rifle stock material used on the service rifles that each of these individuals might have carried. Finally, all of the tops were engraved with Baraboo 21, Lifetime Service Award, 2023. Here is a short video that talks about the Baraboo 21, the namesake of this service award.
My son and I decided that we are going to donate these four pens which was a little bit of a challenge because his teacher insisted on paying for them to which we declined. Instead he has invited us to set up a table with pens for sale and he intends to plug our donation and our pens that we will have available for purchase. Whether we sell any or not is it a win all around in my book.
Each year this organizations serves free breakfast to any Veterans in our county followed by a short ceremony where they honor a different group of Vets. This year they will be honoring those who served in the Persian Gulf. Initially he was talking about 125 pens, which I really could not commit to because of the timing and lack of funding for the organization to purchase that many pens. It was then scaled back to 50-60 pens which still proved to be a funding issue. Through further discussion he he decided to order 4 pens to honor four Veterans that will be receiving Lifetime Service awards. One of the Vets is a very healthy and active WWII Vet. Another is a Korean War Vet and the remaining two Vets served stateside in the 60's. Al of these men are rather active in our community as well as local Veterans organizations.
All of the pens are made with vintage spent military brass. The WWII Vet will be receiving a pen made with a 30-06 casing stamped out in 1943. The Korean war Vet will receive a pen made with a 30-06 casing stamped out in 1954 and the remaining two pens are made with 7.62x51 (308) casings stamped out in 1965. All are toped with walnut tops which was the typical rifle stock material used on the service rifles that each of these individuals might have carried. Finally, all of the tops were engraved with Baraboo 21, Lifetime Service Award, 2023. Here is a short video that talks about the Baraboo 21, the namesake of this service award.
My son and I decided that we are going to donate these four pens which was a little bit of a challenge because his teacher insisted on paying for them to which we declined. Instead he has invited us to set up a table with pens for sale and he intends to plug our donation and our pens that we will have available for purchase. Whether we sell any or not is it a win all around in my book.
