MANCELONA — The Chain O’ Lakes Sportsman’s Club is celebrating its 20th anniversary with an Open House from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at its facility two miles west of Mancelona on Highway M-88.
The Open House coincides with the 9th annual M88 Outdoor Market Tour, a 26-mile long sale that spans the entire distance of M-88 from Mancelona, through Bellaire, Central Lake, and Eastport in Antrim County.
Club members will welcome visitors to the facility at 840 Peterson Road and offer tours of the club’s professional-grade skeet and trap fields, archery range and rifle ranges. The property also includes many pistol shooting bays, including the Badwater Cowboys Western-themed shooting area.
“Our Cowboys and Cowgirls will introduce visitors to cowboy action shooting,” said Eldon McPherson, club founder and secretary. “In some of the other pistol bays, visitors can see — and even try — USPSA-style action shooting demonstrations. Dressed in period attire, they demonstrate their skills with authentic-style revolvers, shotguns and rifles.”
The club was organized in 2006 when a mix of local residents and former members of the Elk Rapids Sportsman’s Club joined together.
“We shared an interest in promoting safe shooting sports and youth education, and a strong desire to involve young people in learning firearm safety,” McPherson said. “We want to help remove the stigma that all guns are evil.”
Over the years, the club has offered a variety of shotgun sports, including sporting clays, five-stand, skeet and trap shooting. Club members built regulation-size trap and skeet fields and expanded to accommodate additional shooting disciplines.
Pistol shooting activities also expanded, resulting in the development of eight bays and a dedicated sight-in bay for handguns. Club members formed an action pistol shooting group whose participants compete in sanctioned matches featuring multiple courses of fire.
The club later developed a 200-yard rifle range and is currently expanding it into a three-lane, 400-yard long-range facility.
An archery range was developed to serve both club members and youth programs. Through partnerships with the Bellaire Youth Initiative and other organizations, the club has introduced several generations of young people to safe shooting, hunting and friendly competition.
The archery area is also used for Michigan Department of Natural Resources Hunter Safety Education field days and other youth events.
The club’s 100-yard rifle range is used for annual sight-in days each November, which serve as a fundraiser for the organization.
“Our club has certified firearm safety instructors and offers CPL classes,” McPherson said. “We provide our range to local law enforcement officers for training at no charge. We also hosted the Michigan Tactical Officers Association for two years as officers completed recertification training.”