Because the youngsters are missing, the regular shooters have disbanded.
However, this does not mean that the history of the oldest Pöckinger club will be forgotten.
Because the other sport shooters in the village take on the willing members and rename themselves - in the United Schützengesellschaft Pöcking.
Pöcking - The history of the Schützengesellschaft Stamm ends where it began: in the Poelt house on Pöckinger Hauptstrasse. The club founded in 1859 as the Pöcking Schützengesellschaft has never been at home anywhere else. In the parlor of the Gasthof zur Post hang framed black and white photos and wooden shooting targets. Memories of competitions and their winners, of festivals and their participants. Then Alexander Wehnelt opens another window on the 162-year history of the oldest Pöckinger club. To be precise, it is a wooden flap in the wall that once gave a view of the dining room next door. “They shot through into the other room earlier. The guests then had to move to the side, ”he says. Later, the 78-year-old with a full white beard will say - much more melancholy -: "I was elected,to run an association - not to dissolve it. "
This is exactly what Wehnelt, the last master rifleman of the regular rifle group, and the 45 or so remaining members have just behind them. A good 30 voted (corona-related by letter) for the dissolution, some did not even react to the letter from the board of directors. "It was a development that we could no longer oppose," says Wehnelt, referring to the youth problem that many other shooting clubs are also familiar with.
And yet the sporting life goes on for those who want to.
Because the other club is playing in town.
The game shooters, who have been using the modern, new shooting range in the club's house since the beginning of 2020, have agreed to accept the remaining regular shooters.
And they accept one condition: the renaming of the club in "United Schützengesellschaft Pöcking".
It should be carried out this year.
"Some mourn the name," reports master rifleman Walter Stumpenhausen.
In the end, however, the three-quarters majority required by the statutes voted for the renaming.
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Jungschützen pose in front of the Gasthof zur Post in Pöcking in 1908.
In the middle in uniform: rifleman Clemens Poelt.
© Stammschützen
So the two clubs have found the simplest solution.
Stumpenhausen speaks of a "cold fusion".
A real, legitimate one was far too bureaucratic for the shooters.
Formal or informal: the association is long overdue.
It has been planned for the clubs to join forces for pragmatic reasons for 26 years.
In 1995, the then master riflemen signed a letter of intent.
So now what belonged together as the Pöcking shooting company until 1919 is growing together again.
There were times when female marksmen were still decried as "shotgun women".
At least with those who broke up because of the first woman to shoot in the club, founded an all-male club and called themselves game shooters.
Until the early 1970s, women were not allowed to participate in the game shooters.
A few utensils from the regular riflemen, such as the flag with the year 1866 embroidered on it, are already in the house of the clubs. The club's history lives on there. Just like in the Gasthaus zur Post. The shooting targets and historical photos will get stuck in the parlor. The landlord, Thomas Poelt, has assured this out of connection with his own family history. His father, Leonhard Poelt, now 91, was a member of the association for over 70 years. His father Clemens, in turn, presided over him for half a century. It was he who ensured that things continued after the Second World War in 1951.
Poelt's portrait adorns the center of a large royal disk on the wall.
Under her, the older regular shooters still want to get together from time to time, despite the dissolution and the move to the house of the clubs.
Alexander Wehnelt says: “We want to meet once a month.
Our focus is not on shooting, but on crouching. "
162 years of Stammschützen: Milestones in the club's history
The Schützengesellschaft Pöcking emerged from a regulars' table of cultivated gentlemen of the village upper class - probably in 1859. An exact date of foundation cannot be found in the old log books, according to the commemorative publication for the 160th anniversary in 2019. A full 40 years, from 1888 Until 1928, the pastor Ottmar Sauter headed the association.
"He was an enthusiastic supporter of the shooter business, but never picked up a rifle," writes Reiner Mengis in the Chronicle.
In 1903 the society split - because the young members wanted to be more ambitious in shooting.
They founded the Jungschützen, the old ones founded the Altschützen at the same time.
In 1933 the two factions were to reunite under the old name.
The most influential man in the club's history is Clemens Poelt.
Schützenmeister since 1908, he led a “tribe” of members to re-establish it after the Second World War - hence the name.
The American occupiers had banned the use of weapons and rifle clubs.
In 1953 the Schützen had 71 members, many of them women.
The year before, Anni Kolbig had won the Königsschießen - as the first woman ever.
During the Gausschießen in 1954, the shooting was no longer in the pub, but in the Poelt family's barn next door.
The shooting ranges were modernized in 1966, the expansion to eight electronic ranges was in 1994.
