W. Caldwell marksman is a big shot when it comes to charity

by Ron Kaplan
NJJN Staff Writer

Steve Roman came to shotgun sports as a hobby relatively late in life. It was about 30 years ago that the 66-year-old resident of West Caldwell got started.

“For one reason or another, I made very, very good progress,” he said in an interview at the North Jersey Gun Club in Fairfield, the air punctuated by shotgun blasts as he spoke. “I was competitive within maybe two months.”

His problem was that he actually did too well too soon. “The better you shoot, the more difficult your handicap” — that is, having to shoot farther from the target. “So as I found out, due to my stupidity, I should not have progressed so fast.”

Despite that handicap, Roman has excelled in competition. Most recently, at the Northern NJ Zone State Trap Shooting Championship in May, he took first place in the A-class doubles and veteran (over 65) singles categories.

His record of success has even caused Roman to be a bit jaded. “I’ve got a closet full of trophies,” he said. “When I first started out, that meant something. I’ve won state championships, local championships, regional championships…. Maybe at 66 my perspective has changed.”

And so have his priorities. When his wife, Linda, was stricken with cancer, he turned his talent with a shotgun into a way to raise funds and awareness in search of a cure for the disease.

“Once she was diagnosed, I was frustrated because not be a physician, being a husband, what can I do? The only thing I’m any good at is raising money.”

Roman, who works as a management consultant, is an adviser to the board of the SynCure Cancer Research Foundation. The organization seeks to accelerate the development of new cancer treatments and provide educational programs for cancer patients and their families so they can make better informed health care choices.

Asked to pick his “career highlight,” Roman didn’t hesitate. “I enjoy putting on events and raising money. I get more of a kick putting a shoot on where we raise $25,000-$30,000.” All told, he estimated his events have raised about $300,000.

Roman and his family attended Congregation Agudath Israel of West Essex in Caldwell until the bat mitzva of his younger daughter, Jennifer (who was a member of the rifle team at James Caldwell High School). These days, Roman and his wife attend Pine Brook Jewish Center in Montville on the High Holy Days.

Like many skilled hobbyists, Roman was more eager to talk about his craft than himself.

Shotguns range in cost from $350 to more than $200,000, but price has little to do with whether it shoots well. “Big toys for big boys,” he said, comparing it to choosing a car. “You can buy one for $15,000 or you can buy a Rolls Royce.”

In a typical practice session at the Fairfield facility, a shooter will use 100 rounds of 12-gauge shells (which costs $16-$20), moving through five semicircular “trap houses” that toss out the circular clay targets at each of five positions.

Roman was eager to enlist a new recruit into the sport. After a primer on the different styles of shooting (today’s demonstration was “American trap”) and safety, he urged his interviewer to try it for himself. This reporter, more used to firing questions than guns, missed several attempts at targets moving at 70 mph before finally bringing one down.

It’s not a good eye or a steady hand one needs to succeed, Roman said. “It’s an open mind; recognize that you don’t want to imitate [the shooting styles of] other people.”

Roman said he believes shooting is a safe sport, accessible to anyone, regardless of physical condition. “We have people shooting in wheelchairs, people with one eye, on crutches. We have champions who are 80 years old and kids of 14.”

Some of the best shooters at the club, which boasts a membership of about 400, are in their 70s, he said. “Most of the people in this club are businesspeople, retirees, or professionals. The chairman of the department of neurology at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital…is a member; we also have apprentice plumbers. That’s the gamut. Everything under the sun. Ethnically, everything under the sun. That’s the thing I find enjoyable about it: You have a broad variety of people, different ages, different backgrounds. It makes it interesting.”

Roman also said, “You’d be surprised at the number of Jewish shooters.” He pointed out a few men on the range and identified them as such, calling over one elderly gentleman, 80-year-old Artie Goodman, a West Orange resident. Roman calls Goodman “the oldest living Jew shooting.” He took up shotguns when tennis elbow prevented him from shooting target pistols.

Roman is busy getting ready for his next fund-raising event, the Fall Blast 2006, to be held Oct. 22 in Chatham Township.

The nice thing about these shoots, he said, is that nobody really cares about their scores. “We have people who are world-class shooters next to people who are novices. The bottom line is, you do your own thing, and I think that’s the enjoyment part of it.”